Interracial Figures of the American Renaissance Essay

In this paper I will compare the writings of Harriet Jacobs and Frederick Douglass. I will touch on their genre, purpose, content, and style. Both authors were born into slavery. Both escaped to freedom and fought to bring an end to slavery, each in their own way. Both Jacobs and Douglass have a different purpose for their writings.

Margaret Mead, an American cultural anthropologist who became known as an author and speaker during the 1960s and 70s, once said, “never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” Indeed, that is exactly what the members of the Harlem Renaissance did. People like Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen wrote political pieces which changed the way people viewed slavery and white supremacy. Frederick Douglass’ autobiography, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave” was a crucial part of the Harlem Renaissance. His book is an important piece of American history because of its role as a voice for the voiceless as well as its credibility and persuasiveness which inspired many other writers of the time to showcase their talents.

Falling in love has been a common theme of literature since people first started writing. The romantic era of literature was from the late 1700’s to the mid 1800’s. James Fenimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans was written at the peak of this era in 1826. Many have critiqued Cooper’s writing style, but few have critiqued his content due to it being so controversial. Cooper uses the romance between the characters, Cora and Uncas, to cover racial stereotypes and inequalities throughout The Last of the Mohicans.

Harriet Ann Jacobs helped start a movement of anti-slavery writing that, through literature, would eventually help change society’s view of slavery. Jacobs’ “Incidents” was written for an audience of free white women and its purpose was to involve these women in political action against the institution of chattel slavery and the ideology of white racism” confirming herself as an anti-slavery writer using a fictional character and different voice to tell truth (Yellin

Since the beginning of writing, literature has played a pivotal role in shaping the history of the world. The same holds true when referring to the early American history topic of slavery. Many abolitionists wrote in hopes that their views will persuade people in America to take a stand against slavery. While there were many authors that led the anti-slavery movement, the most successful writers were the slaves that lived through this atrocious time period and were able to recall their experiences. Two prominent authors during this time period were Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs. While the two writers shared many common experiences due to their time being a slave, they also had had a variety of differences. Harriet Jacobs wrote mostly wrote in a way that appealed to people’s emotions and focused on what a woman goes through as a slave; whereas Douglass focused on freedom and manhood.

In their narratives Frederick Douglass’ and Harriet Jacobs’ recount the agony they have gone through in a slaveholding society, where gender played a deceiving role during the captiva-tion. For slaves it was impossible to achieve designated stereotypical roles of the sexes, respec-tively for male and female, as the only officially recognized gender at that time. While Harriet Jacobs was restricted in her aspire for freedom due to her role conflict as mother and slave, Fred-erick Douglass seems distant to family matters and focused on getting his independence and pride back with education and resistance. Both were constrained to follow the general pictures default to fit the American culture and the norms set by society towards gender throughout their captivation as slaves. Yet, these specific examples of their life are despite their differences, very similar in their desires.

The phrase “art imitates life” can be used to describe many works of literature. Authors and the stories they write are often influenced by the changing world around them along with the evolution of new perspectives and ways of thinking regarding a subject. While this may sound simply like a common literary trope, it is of great importance and significance in many genres of literature. None has this been more apparent than in both the anti-slavery and women’s empowerment movement of the early to mid-1800s. Two major influence authors in their respective subjects, Frederick Douglass and Fanny Fern, were heavily influenced by the changing societal trends of the time of which they expressed through their writing. Douglass’s speech in particular “What to a Slave is the 4th of July?” was heavily influenced by Douglass’s own personal experience as a slave as well as the rising prominence of the abolitionist movement in the United States. By referencing the contradictory nature of the Constitution relegating personal freedoms exclusively to white, property owning males, Douglass bluntly references the systematic inequalities faced by people of color in the United States. Never would the works of an African American author, especially one challenging the established institution of slavery, gain so much attention if not for the anti-slavery movement and shifting perspectives surrounding it.

Harriet Jacobs and Frederick Douglass both wrote narratives that detailed their lives as slaves in the antebellum era. Both of these former slaves managed to escape to the North and wanted to expose slavery for the evil thing it was. The accounts tell equally of depravity and ugliness though they are different views of the same rotten institution. Like most who managed to escape the shackles of slavery, these two authors share a common bond of tenacity and authenticity. Their voices are different—one is timid, quiet, and almost apologetic while the other one is loud, strong, and confident—but they are both authentic. They both also through out the course of their narratives explain their desires to be free from the horrible practice of slavery.

It is stated, “It was merely a nondescript collection of houses and buildings in a region of farms- one of those sad American places with sidewalks, but no paved streets; electric lights, but no sewage; a station but no trains that stopped…And it was 150 miles from any city at all (Hughes, 3).” Even though Cora was a relying, humble and hard working women she was unaccepted to white society. Cora was only seen for her labor. It is stated, “Cora iron my stockings, Cora come here… Cora, put… Cora… Cora… Cora! Cora! (Hughes, 4).” At a very young age colored people had to work for a living. On the other hand white society had an education and a far better future. Therefore, the circumstance of working with unpleasant superior was not discussed. Any job at the time was appreciated. Throughout the years that Cora worked with the Studevants she fell in love and had a child. At this time contraception or birth control was illegal. Even though Cora was looked down by society she had no shamed and became a proud mother. Unfortunately, due to the lack of medical assistance her child died from whopping cough. The years passed and the Studevants had a child named Jessie which Cora nursed and treated her as a daughter. When Jessie was in high school she experienced Cora’s situation, pregnant and unmarried. On one side Cora advise to have the child and become a proud mother just like her, but the mother disagreed she viewed this situation

The Harlem Renaissance was different than I thought it was. I had imagined it was a time of African American’s gathering together in small groups and reading poems and writing stuff. When I began researching, the things that I found blew my mind. Seeing all of the big names of the Renaissance was cool because I have heard these names all my life, but never realized why those names were significant. Being a student in band, the name Louis Armstrong has been a name I have heard since 6th grade. Up until this project, I never knew the extent of the impact he made on the world of music.

Harriet Jacobs, a black woman who escapes slavery, illustrates in her biography Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) that death is preferable to life as a slave due to the unbearable degradation of being regarded as property, the inevitable destruction of slave children’s innocence, and the emotional and physical pain inflicted by slave masters. Through numerous rhetorical strategies such as allusion, comparison, tone, irony, and paradoxical expression, she recounts her personal tragedies with brutal honesty. Jacobs’s purpose is to combat the deceptive positive portrayals of slavery spread by southern slave holders through revealing the true magnitude of its horrors. Her intended audience is uninvolved northerners, especially women, and she develops a personal and emotionally charged relationship with them.

During the final years of legal slave ownership in the United States, the slave narrative became a popular way for literate enslaved people to express their anti-slavery stance through their own testimony. Two of the most influential writers on the slave narrative topic were the autobiographical authors Fredrick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs. Since Douglas and Jacobs were both born in a similar time period, there are many similarities found in their works. Douglass’s Narrative of the life of Fredrick Douglass, an American Slave is closely comparable to Jacobs’s Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl when analyzing how they represented their enslavement in their autobiographies. The two authors have similar ideas when portraying their struggles with forced ignorance. Their writing also contains parallels with the corrupting power of slavery for the slave owners, as well as the parallels in pointing out the hypocrisies of using the bible to defend slavery. These similarities can be explained in part due to Douglass and Jacobs following the same basic slave narrative outline to maintain the shared goal of abolishing slavery in the United States.

Jacobs autobiography which is known by the name of ‘Incidents in a Life of a Slave Girl’ gave a true account of the treatment that black women faced during that time and also throwing some light on a perception which has been kept in shadows from the society. While writing the story of her life, Jacobs though focused on her defeat due to obstacles like race and gender, gave voice to something which was hidden from society regardless of the presence of patriarchal society of the nineteenth century.

Like Douglass, Jacobs also exposed the harsh treatment towards slaves while proving that American “blacks could succeed at the same activities as whites” (Hunter-Willis 26) through her own narrated experiences. Her resolve to write demonstrated a “resistance to the patriarchal system of slavery” (Peterson 158) by sharing the exploits of slavery through her own point of view.

Some families have similar parent child dynamics and a few have different ones. The historical fiction novel, The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper, reveals different parent child relationships. Uncas is the son of Chingachgook and the last of the Mohicans. Alice and Cora are half sisters and Colonel Munro’s daughters. The relationship with Uncas and his Dad is different from Cora and Alice with their father but the have similarities.