Twelve Years a Slave Film Adaptation

12 Years a Slave is a historical drama, directed by Steve McQueen, which was released in 2014. The film won best picture at the 87th Academy Awards, and budgeted over 187 million dollars worldwide at the box office. The brutally violent film is about a slave named Solomon Northup, and all his struggles through being a slave. It starts with Northup thinking that he was offered a job, but instead is brought into slavery. Perhaps the most despicable character shown throughout the film is Edwin Epps. He not only beats his slaves, but is also shown frequently raping Patsey, who is also a slave. One of the characters in the film, Samuel

thesis:Twelve Years a Slave, is a vivid memoir of Northup's captivity as free man in the slave ridden south. Solomon's experience was one of countless millions kidnapped, and sold into slavery. What makes his Solomon's story unique, is that he lived to tell the, horrors and atrocities of slavery.

The film 12 Years is an accurate and verifiable account of the common slave experience in the United States in the antebellum South. 12 Years a Slave is set in the mid to late 1800s and tells a true life story of the life of Solomon Northup a free Black man sold south into slavery. He was the son of an emancipated slave. Northup was from upstate New York, and was kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South. Northup lived, worked, and was married in upstate New York, where his family resided. He was a multifaceted laborer and also an accomplished violin player. He was subjected to the cruelty for the next twelve years while he survived as the human property of several different slave masters, He continually struggled to survive and maintain some of his dignity. Then in the 12th year of the disheartening ordeal, a chance meeting with an abolitionist from Canada he was was finally freed and is taken home. After being unsuccessful in prosecuting his kidnappers, Northup continues upriver to New York, where he is finally reunited with his family and where he meets his grandson, Solomon Northup Staunton, for the first time. In the end, Northup gives one final, powerful argument against the evils of the slave industry, pointing not to rhetoric or debates, but lifting up his own life story as a vivid commentary for viewers to consider. The main idea of the book was to share with the reader and give

Platt is a horrible cotton picker so Epps hires him out to a man named Hawkins who is a sugar cane grower. Platt becomes the lead row for 3 years on the cane field. Around Christmas time, the slaves get 3 days off. Other plantations get 4, 5, or 6 days off depending on how generous their masters are. Around the holidays, Platt is hired by the neighboring farmers to play the violin. He starts making some extra money, and is very happy. Before long he becomes the driver. This is a position of authority and he uses it to be easy on the slaves when the master isn 't close by. He is the driver for several years and becomes very good at fake whipping the slaves. It has been a while since Platt has run into any conflicts when one night Epps comes home drunk and tries to cut Platt 's throat. Epps tells Platt he is not to have a pen, paper, or any books. Right around this time, Platt gets a hold of a piece of paper. He makes ink out of bark and a pen out of a duck feather. He writes a letter, it is his chance to save himself from this cursed life. One day a white man named Arsby comes to try and get the job of overseer. He works with the slaves for a while when Platt gets up the courage to ask him if he will mail the letter for him. Arsby tells Epps about his encounter with Platt. When Epps finds out he goes right to Platt and confronts him about it. Platt convinces Epps that he cannot write a letter and if he could he doesn 't even have anyone to write to. He tells Epps that

to work in sugarcane plantations. Solomon was put in charge of a gang of up to 100 slaves for three years. The only time the slaves got off on Epps’ plantation was three days around Christmas. One plantation in the area hosted a celebration for all the slaves from the surrounding area. Solomon was called upon to play his violin at the celebration. The celebrations were usually happy and everyone looked nice and there were even marriages, but it only existed for three days of the year. Solomon became a driver on Epps’ plantation. Drivers were black slaves who helped the white overseer and were forced to whip some of the slaves in their gang. Solomon was very reluctant to do this but still did it without letting up when Epps was around. If Epps

Solomon Northup was born a free man in Minerva, New York, in 1808. Little is known about his mother, whom his narrative does not identify by name. His father, Mintus, was originally enslaved to the Northup family from Rhode Island, but he was freed after the family moved to New York. As a young man, Northup helped his father with farming chores and worked as a raftsman on the waterways of upstate New York. He married Anne Hampton, a woman of mixed (black, white, and Native American) ancestry, on Christmas Day, 1829. They had three children together. During the 1830s, Northup became locally renowned as an excellent fiddle-player. In 1841, two men offered Northup generous wages to join a traveling musical show, but soon after he accepted,

When you think of slavery and how the experience of being a slave must have been like, you might think of picking cotton, or a cruel overseer who lashed slaves regularly. And while it’s true that many slaves experienced something along these lines, the slave narratives of the library of Congress illustrate that every slave’s story is a little different. The story of Solomon Northup, portrayed in his book 12 Years A Slave, is one much different from other slave narratives, such as the story of Amos Gadsden. The two stories differ in the way the stories are told, the men’s experiences as slaves and in their slaveowners.

Not that any kind of slave owner was morally correct, but 12 Years a Slave shows the different kind of slave owners and interesting relationships they had with slaves while some were treated not as poorly as others. A slave owner named Ford brings up a different side of slave ownership and shows a substantial contrast between how he treats his slaves and how master Epps treats his. He’s a slave master, but he doesn’t personally beat anyone, and he has some sympathy for the plight of the lead character, Solomon Northup. Even more interestingly, Ford is seen as 'good' in Northup's eyes because he doesn't practice any of the cruelties and physical abuses quite usual and even acceptable in that time and place and because he is genuinely devout and sees his slaves as his equals before God. Not only did some slave owners treat their slaves better than others, but some men who owned slaves used them as sexual partners. For example, Eliza in the film is a female slave who is sexually abused by her master Edwin Epps and becomes his mistress. The most disturbing part is that Eliza becomes the mistress of her master because she is promised freedom for herself and her children if she will live Epps after his separation from his wife. Another female slave named Harriet is kept also kept as a mistress, of Master Shaw, a nearby farm owner. She plays along with the master’s affection as long as it continues to help her

12 Years a Slave was an outstanding representation of the lives of a slave. It was accurate, heartfelt, and detailed. It portrays the feelings of Solomon and the other slaves perfectly. The film really makes you think about the people and the situation back in the 1840’s. It is an exceptional historical film that teaches you the slavery times and the life of Solomon Northup. A freeman turned to a slave and put through a terrible life experience that no one should ever have to go

survive and comply the master’s orders, beaten and labored until their bodies just couldn’t take it anymore, the conditions that a typical slave would experience on a daily basis. When you hear these conditions being depicted, you’d instantaneously think of an animal that is being captivated. However, in this situation, slaves are often seen as livestock, sometimes even less than that. Slaves weren’t considered humans, even though they shared the same characteristics of being human as a slave master. Slaves were property, and if they were lucky enough, they were considered very expensive livestock. Solomon Northup’s experience, which is depicted in Twelve Years a Slave, written by himself, demonstrates the daily lives of subordinates. Solomon Northup was an American abolitionist, prior to that, a free-man-turned slave. Being a slave stripped Northup of his identity. Solomon Northup was a freed family-man, violinist, living the typical life of a freed African American man in the 19th Century. According to Girogio Agamben, bare life is ____________ and Northup was deprived of that. Solomon had self-emancipation, to be a free man, self-empowerment, to be able to have power, and self-enlightenment, to be able to convey knowledge. All of that was torn from him, as the fellows who’d kidnapped and enslaved him, gave him a new identity as Platt.

In the book 12 Years A Slave written from a primary source by Solomon Northup based on a true story describes the triumphant journey Solomon Northup goes through as he never lost hope of regaining his freedom and resisted the dehumanization of enslavement in many ways. Solomon was born a free black man in New York in 1808 while his father, Mintus was born a slave and gained his freedom as their master passed away also inheriting their masters last name "Northup". Growing Solomon worked on a farm with his dad and soon after his dad died in 1829 he soon married a women named Anne Hampton in which they soon moved to Saratoga Springs, New York and had three children of their own. They were living like any other free person was and soon Solomon was working in many industries and Anne established herself as a cook and in the 1830 's Solomon had a reputation of being a well played violinist. In 1841 Solomon had became unemployed and was looking for an occupation, he ran into Merrill Brown and Abram Hamilton in who then offers him a job in a circus playing the violin. As they arrive in Washington D.C. which is slave territory, he begins to become sick and passes out which was planned by Merrill and Abram to poison and kidnap him in the slave territory and sell him in which he soon wakes up in chains in a slave pen. Solomon 's first master was James H. Burch who he was sold by the two men who had

Solomon still wanted to return home and to his free man status. There was not a slave who did not want their freedom. No matter how pleasant or nasty a master was, it is human nature to need freedom. In Twelve Years a Slave it does not appear that a master would feel the obligation to care for his slaves from birth to death. In the case of death, it would be from premature death, not death from old age. As a slave lost his ability

Hope is a pernicious ideal if falsely given to someone and a blessing when it is used as a lifeline or for emotional support. In the narrative Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup, Northup faces many instances where hope serves as his downfall but other times when hope is his only source of sanity during turbulent times. Hope is a belief that is expressed as a double edged sword throughout the novel and is imperative to the formation and flow of the story. Without the blunders and tribulations the story would be considered unrealistic and mundane.

The movie «12 Years a slave» is based on the book «12 Years a Slave» by Soloman Northup. It's his life story of how he got lured in a trap and kidnapped in 1841. It's about how he was sold into slavery in the south, and what happened during those 12 years a slave .

Before the Reconstruction which took place after the Civil War, many slaves began to acquire their freedom by many things, including escaping plantations, buying their freedom, or being granted freedom from their former owners. Once slaves entered the North, they were able to finally be seen as a free African American. The thing that scared African Americans the most, frequently happened, being sent back to the South into slavery. 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup gives a recap of how his life, filled with joy and freedom one day, became a living nightmare the next. Northup, a self-taught, master violin player is fooled into traveling with “gentlemen” to share his talents for a small fortune. Leaving his family behind, he decides to go with the men and once he reaches New York City, the men convince Northup to travel to Washington D.C. Solomon soon began feeling sick and one day wakes up chained in a cell. Next thing he knows, he is being sold into slavery. He lives a life of a slave for twelve years until he is rescued by Henry B. Northup, who saves Solomon while he was working in the field. Once back in his own home, Solomon writes an autobiography of his experiences. After many decades, a historical movie retelling Solomon’s autobiography was released. Throughout the movie, many differences are present. For example, the wife of Solomon’s master was portrayed to be an evil woman in the movie, but in the book not so evil. Another example is while slaves did not fight back