Genre

1. Declarations in DialogueNARRATIVE of the life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave Written by Himself

2. Genre • Autobiography: a crafted story • Slave narrative: a familiar genre • Both genres located between history and literature • Rhetorical purposes: for self-reflection, to create a public picture of the self and the life, to advance a cause through the narrative of a life experience

3. American autobiography • Puritans as God’s elect; preoccupation with the self -- diaries, journals, meditations • Jonathan Edwards, “Personal Narrative” (c. 1740) • Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography (1771-88) • Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance” (1841): “Man is his own star” • Enlightenment focus on the individual: responsibility for actions, autonomy, “striving,” isolation • America: an exceptional land; a new and empty land; opportunities for creativity: “the American, this new man” (Crèvecoeur)

4. Slave narratives • Documentary contributions requiring interpretation • Very popular form: over 100 book-length slave narratives • Relation between speeches and print texts: narratives as “structured formal revisions of spoken works organized and promoted by anti-slavery organizations” (Davis and Gates xvi) “It was the face of the race that the slave narrators painted, so as to give it a voice. It is this notion of the presence of voice and self-creation through representation, transferred to writing through the metaphor of voice, which motivated the ex-slaves to produce hundreds of testimonies of their enslavement . . . ” (Davis and Gates xxxi). Davis, Charles T., and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., eds. The Slave’s Narrative. New York: Oxford UP, 1985.

5. Some slave narratives 1760-1845 • 1789, Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narratives of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, written by Himself. London. • 1831, Mary Prince, The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave, Related by Herself, With a Supplement by the Editor, to Which is Added the Narrative of Asa-Asa, A Captured African. London. • 1833, Richard Allen. The Life, Experience, and Gospel Labors of the Right Reverend Richard Allen. Philadelphia. • 1836, Jarena Lee, The Life and Religious Experiences of Jarena Lee, A Coloured Lady, Giving an Account of Her Call to Preach the Gospel. Revised and Corrected from the Original Manuscript, Written by Herself. Philadelphia. • 1840, Juan Francisco Manzano, Poems by a Slave in the Island of Cuba, recently liberated, translated from the Spanish, by R. R. Madden, M. D., with the History of the Early Life of the Negro Poet, written by Himself . . . London.

6. Abolitionist movementS Extensive history in England, France, and American 1775, Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage, Philadelphia (Quakers) 1775, Thomas Paine, “African Slavery in America” Gradual elimination of slavery in the North: Northwest Ordinance, 1787 Slave trade outlawed by 1807/08, but illegal slave trade continued (e.g., Amistad) 1833, American Anti-Slavery Society, founded by William Lloyd Garrison, Theodore Weld, and Robert Purvis • The Liberator, newspaper, 1831-1865 • Tenets of Garrison’s abolitionism: • Immediate emancipation • Disaffiliation with the U.S. government: the Constitution as a pro-slavery document • Pacifism

7. From the first issue of The Liberator, January 1, 1831 “To the Public” (page 1) Assenting to the‘self-evident truth maintained in the American Declaration of Independence, ‘that all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights--among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,’ I shall strenuously contend for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population.” "I am aware, that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, or speak, or write, with moderation. . . . I am in earnest -- I will not equivocate -- I will not excuse -- I will not retreat a single inch -- AND I WILL BE HEARD.” All issues available online through UCI Library: 19th Century U.S. Newspapers

8. The newspaper speaks!. . . I come, a stranger in this busy sphere,. . . My name is ‘liberator’! I propose to hurl my shafts at freedom’s deadliest foes. . . to redeem the slave!

9. Douglass, abolitionist Orator • 1838, New Bedford, Mass -- subscription to The Liberator: “my soul was set on fire”; “sympathy for my brethren in bonds”; “I got a pretty correct idea of the principles, measures and spirit of the anti-slavery reform . . . I took right hold of the cause” (Narrative 119) • First speech, 1841; hired as a lecturer by Garrison’s organization; approximately 200 speeches between 1839 and 1845 • Douglass’ speeches offered few autobiographical details (Blassingame xlvii-liii) • As a fugitive slave, “Douglass . . . appeared as both victim and victor, exhibiting the nobility and intellect of blacks, and the contradiction that was slavery” (Blassingame xlvii). John W. Blassingame, ed. The Frederick Douglass Papers. Series One: Speeches, Debates, and Interviews. Vol. 1: 1841-46. New Haven: Yale UP, 1979.

10. Pressure to tell his story • “By 1844, Douglass’s oratorical skills and thoughtful analyses caused many observers to doubt him; some claimed he had never been inside the peculiar institution.” (Blassingame) • Danger for a fugitive slave to reveal details: possibility of recapture • Douglass responds to pressure by writing the Narrative (1845): 9 reprints in three years, 11,000 copies, translations

11. from “living evidence” to political actor • Douglass’ relationship with Garrison: tutelage • Peabody’s 1849 review on the Narrative: “He is one of the living evidences that there is in the colored population of the South no natural incapacity for the enjoyment of freedom. . . . [He may be] a most useful laborer in the cause of human rights” (138). • Nathaniel P. Rogers’ review of an 1844 address (139-41): The narrative was “dullish in manner,” but after he closes the narrative he “let out the outraged humanity that was laboring in him, in indignant and terrible speech . . . [reference to Toussaint] . . . He was not up as a speaker--performing. He was an insurgent slave taking hold on the right of speech, and charging on his tyrants the bondage of his race” (141)

12. 3 rhetorical challenges of slave narrative/autobiography • speaking for himself, speaking for others: the power of the exceptional life story, the hazards of representation • beyond spectacle: becoming more than living evidence, the body on display • embedding the argument within the story Rhetors in 19th-century social movements construct ethos so as to dramatize the process by which experience forces a critical analysis of the social order and, in so doing, support arguments for change.

13. Representative Man

14. The problem of the life and body as evidence “It was at once deeply impressed upon my mind, that, Mr. Douglass could be . . . a stunning blow at the same time inflected on Northern prejudice against a colored complexion” (“Preface” by Garrison 32-33). Douglass introduced as “chattel,”“a thing,” a piece of southern ‘property’” (Blassingame l). Douglass participates: “This head, these limbs, this body, I have stolen from my master!”(1846)

15. The “white envelope”: Authentication by white sponsors Garrison’s Preface • Listening to Douglass speak in 1841: • “Capable of high attainments as an intellectual and moral being—needing nothing but a comparatively small amount of cultivation to make him an ornament to society and a blessing to his race . . . “ (32) • “manliness of character”; union of head and heart (33) • The Narrative: D’s choice, style; “entirely his own production” (34) Wendell Phillips, Letter • “When lions write history . . .” (38) • “We have known you long and can put the most entire confidence in your truth, candor, and sincerity”; “a fair specimen of the whole truth” (39) • “the fathers, in 1776, signed the Declaration of Independence with the halter about their necks” (40)

16. A dramatic life story, a crafted story: • I-IV – through the gates of hell: slave child with no family; hunger, cold, witness to violence; subject to brutal economies and lawlessness • V – sent to Baltimore through “the work of Providence”: “I was chosen.” F. has a “deep conviction” that he would not always be a slave (62) • VI-VII -- literacy instruction, interrupted, pursued: “From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom” (64); Columbian Orator; on the docks, the idea of escape • VIII-IX – setbacks: assessed as property, back to the plantation – the “mean” Master Thomas (76) • X – descent into hell: • field work, sent to Covey, the slave-breaker: “the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!” (81) • An appeal to God, apostrophe to the ships: “O that I were free! O, that I were on one of your gallant decks” (83-84) • Fighting Covey: “a turning point in my career as a slave”; the “sense of my own manhood” (89): “a glorious resurrection, from the tomb of slavery, to the heaven of freedom” (89) • XI – abortive escape; final escape: “I felt like one who had escaped a den of hungry lions” (112)

17. Douglass’Narrative: autobiographer as master of his story Blight: “Above all else, this book . . . is a great story told, like most other great stories, out of the will to be known and the will to write” (1). Chapter I: family • “A want of information concerning my own [age] was a source of unhappiness to me even during childhood” (41) • “I never saw my mother” (42-43) • Women being beaten (44-46): F. as spectator; “I wish I could commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld [Aunt Hester’s beating]” (45).

18. Narrator more outside than inside slavery? • Ch. II - Slave songs: “I did not, when a slave, understand the deep meaning of those rude and apparently incoherent songs. I was myself within the circle; so that I neither saw nor heard as those without might see and hear” (51). • “The hearing of those wild notes always depressed my spirit . . . “ • “As I am writing these lines, an expression of feeling has already found its way down my cheek . . . My first glimmering conception of the dehumanizing character of slavery.” – the moralizing function of sentimental fiction: the songs “deepen my hatred of slavery, and quicken my sympathies for my brethren in bonds” • If anyone wishes to be impressed with the soul-killing effects of slavery, let him go . . . , place himself in the deep pine woods, and there let him, in silence, analyze the sounds that shall pass through the chambers of his soul . . . “ (51) 2 perspectives: (a) “Slavery” is not something immediately available to experience. It is learned, reflected upon, remembered. (b) strategy of the former slave/authoritative rhetor/author – to reflect at a distance

19. What can the reader (white) reader know about the life of the slave? “the will to be known”? Ch. III: slaves suppressing the truth: “a still tongue makes a wise head” (54) Ch. XI: “I would keep the merciless slaveholder profoundly ignorant of the means of flight adopted by the slave. I would leave him to imagine himself surrounded by myriads of invisible tormentors . . . Let him feel his way in the dark; let darkness commensurate with his crime hover over him . . . Let us render the tyrant no aid; let us not hold the light by which he can trace the footprints of our flying brother” (107). Withholding feelings: “It is impossible for me to describe my feelings as the time of my contemplated start drew near” (110). “I have been frequently asked how I felt when I found myself in a free State. I have never been able to answer the question with any satisfaction to myself” (111).

20. The first Villain Ch. IV: Austin Gore, the overseer – mastering the slave’s dread through the narrator’s style “He was just the man for such a place, and it was just the place for such a man.” (55) “To be accused was to be convicted, and to be convicted was to be punished; the one always following the other with immutable certainty” (56) “He was ambitious enough . . . Persevering enough . . . Cruel enough . . . Obdurate enough to be insensible to the voice of a reproving conscience” (56) 3 murders: crimes against others (a young girl, an old man) (57-59)

21. Literacy: the pathway from slavery to freedom Ch. V-VII, to Baltimore with Hugh and Sophie Auld “The ties that ordinarily bind children to their homes were all suspended in my case” (60). Looking ahead rather than behind (61) Rapturous arrival: a “white face beaming with the most kindly emotions” (61-62) “I was chosen from among them all” – “a special interposition of divine Providence” (62) From angel to demon; Hugh Auld, the second villain: “his heart must be harder than stone” (65) Regarding Hugh Auld: “What he most dreaded, that most desired. What he most loved, that I most hated. . . . (64) Female slaves “contending with the pigs for the offal thrown into the street” (65): as Fred rises, women slaves remain in abject

22. Chapter VII • Heard students reading from The Columbian Orator, 1797, on the docks; bought a copy • Collection of speeches and writings • http://digital.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/t/text/text-idx?idno=00acf6728m;view=toc;c=nietz

23. Coming to consciousness • turning poor white boys into teachers (67), but also interlocutors – “I used to talk this matter of slavery over with them” – they created a public on the docks • Being a slave for life (67): discontent – “Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of thinking!” (68 • abolition– Fred, a ready listener: what is “abolition”?; newspaper article about petitions (69) • Escape required writing: learning to write in the shipyard: copybooks (70)

24. “Dialogue between a master and a slave” (Blight 129-31) • The slave is represented as having been recaptured, . . . and the master opens the dialogue with an upbraiding speech, charging the slave with ingratitude, and demanding to know what he has to say in his own defense. • “Touched by the slave‘s answer, the master tells him he is permitted to speak for himself. Thus invited to the debate, the slave made a spirited defense of himself, and thereafter the whole argument, for and against slavery, was brought out. The master was vanquished at every turn in the argument; and seeing himself to be thus vanquished, he generously and meekly emancipates the slave, with his best wishes for his prosperity. . . . I could not help feeling that the day might come, when the well-directed answers made by the slave to the master, in this instance, would find their counterpart in myself.” • “The moral which I gained from the dialogue was the power of truth over the conscience of even a slaveholder” (68) • Sheridan’s speeches for emancipation of Catholics: “a powerful vindication of human rights” (68)

25. Back to the Plantation: Conditions for consciousness, Ch. VIII-IX • “I saw more clearly” (71); “I suffered more anxiety than most of my fellow-slaves” (72). “My poor old grandmother . . .” (73-74) • The slave holiday: the cunning slaveholder gives “a dose of vicious dissipation, artfully labelled with the name of liberty” (91); “we had almost as well be slaves to man as to rum”; a system of “fraud and inhumanity” • Sabbath school: “Their minds had been starved by their cruel masters. They had been shut up in mental darkness” (95). • “[At Mr. Garnder’s] I was kept in such a perpetual whirl of excitement, I could think of nothing, scarcely, but my life; and in thinking of my life, I almost forgot my liberty” (106). • “to make a contented slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. . . He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery . . . And he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be a man” (106) • Ch. XI, Master Thomas: “if I would be happy, I must lay out no plans for the future . . . setting aside my intellectual nature” (108)

26. A narrative of triumphant manhood? More victor than victim • Ch. X: • Fred “broken” by Covey • The apostrophe to the ships (84) • The battle with Covey: “turning-point in my career,” revived sense of manhood, “glorious resurrection” (89) • Sabbath school • Back to Baltimore, laboring (105-06) Ch. XI: escape “Douglass’s preoccupation with manhood and power all but erases any self-representation linking him to women, family, and intimacy” (David Leverenz 109) Douglass as Faustian striver, self-made man, enacting the “repression of the feminine required by middle-class virility” (Jenny Franchot 149)

27. For next Wed./Thurs., 2/20, 21 • A close look at Chapters X and XI • A reconsideration of the narrative as an introduction to the institution of slavery: the persuasive force of sentimental rhetoric in the context of reform movements • from solitary striving to the forging of bonds