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Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, has received generally positive reviser and reached the bestseller Immediately once published. These achievements were definitely exceptional and extraordinary for a slave living nineteenth century America, where slaves were refrain from gaining literacy in everywhere of the nation.
Therefore, the following article is going to analysis the narrative from three perspectives-??ethical, logical and motional appeals and see how justified his indomitable view that slavery is injustice. Frederick Douglass, a black slave previously, witnessed the Inhumane slavery tragedies and therefore able to unfurled his narrative In a first-person perspective and a chronological timeline. More importantly, he was one of the very few slaves who managed to gain literacy, which made him became the “monopoly source of slave narrative”.
That Douglass possessed this monopoly astonished the public and raised his credibility quickly and significantly. In deed, contemporary social background has predestined the scanty of lettered lave, as further proved In the text “If you teach a Niger how to read, there would be no keeping him”. The thought that “slaves should not be permitted the right to gain literacy’ entrenched so deeply in people’s mindset that it resulted in a lacking of reliable narrative sources.
That Douglass was about to write drew public attention, put him under the limelight, and made him the only loud voice that had tremendously increase his credibility. In addition, Douglass succeeds in using a chronological flow of narrative that clearly recounts his previous miserable life condition under which he bear and manifests how the idea of “freedom” had gradually swell In his mind. The chronological accounts testify his previous encounters from the very beginning of the narrative “My first mistress was a woman of… To “l had resided but a short time in Baltimore” to “Very soon after I went to live with,” Douglass shows to his readers a clear time pattern, his whereabouts, telling them that his words are truly reliable. His track become even more trustworthy with the supplement of his mental development: from the very first time he realized his tragic Identity “l was not about helve year old… Thought of being a slave for life” to “the silver triumph of freedom…
Douglass marked down a gradual process of how his psyche driven to maturity, foreshadowing his later rebellion. The first-hand accounts and his “monopoly source of narrative” makes Douglass the only and the most steady source of slave narrative. Douglass logical appeals run through the narrative, discrediting the practice of slavery by demonstrating that slavery obliterated humanity, divest human being’s Douglass starts his narrative by recounting the first encounter he had with his sisters, who was “a woman of the kindest heart and the finest feelings”.
No later in the narrative, Douglass shows that the “kind heart had but a short time remain such”; By casting a significant contrast on the attitude of his mistress’s before and after her acceptance of slaves, Douglass demonstrates to us that slavery could totally eradicate and obliterate people’s kindness however tolerable people were previously. Douglass then points out the injustice of slavery, citing that it fetter slaves physically and mentally.
Physically ,slaves were “narrowly watched in a separated room for inconsiderable length of time”, and, ideologically, slaves were refrain from reading and learning: when at the very beginning Douglass mistress taught him how to read and write, her husband dropped by, telling her not to teach, “If you teach a slave read and write, there will be no keeping of him”. That slaves were divest of the abilities, even the possibilities to gain literacy has been injustice and unconstitutional from a nowadays’ standpoint.
Even more devastating thing was that Douglass was too obsessed with the idea of freedom that he deeply entrenched himself into it, “That as the first time I had the idea of freedom… Get rid of thinking… ‘ should have killed myself” The inner heart voice reveal to us the despair within Douglass mindset swelled when he gain some literacy and finally realized his situation of “being a slave for life. ” The emotional appeals constitute a large portion of Frederick Douglass narrative.
By employing poignant vocabulary to portray their harsh lives conditions and the inner heart struggles, Douglass successfully spurred up the empathy from his audience, which is the contemporary readers. Specifically, he recounts his own struggles with his mistress and tragic encounters and the experience he had when he was sent under other’s disposal during which he witnessed the inhumane treatment his companions and his amiable grandmother got. As a victim himself, Douglass was able to not only tell others’ stories, but also recount his own experiences.
In the vignette of his confrontation with his mistress, Douglass puts a heavy emphasis on his soliloquy, or the inner-heart emotional expression he had during the time. Sentences like”… Torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish”‘ open my eye to the horrible pit, but to no ladder open which to get out” demonstrate that tingles were not only remain physically, but more like fire burning in his heart that can’t be quell;alt is like ants in the pants.
Douglass employment of sharp contrast illustrates the torture of lives and vacuum of freedom, calling upon the entire society to reject the unjust slavery. Regarding his credibility, it seems that external factors, the lacking of lettered slaves and tortured social values, combined with his own efforts elevated him to become monopoly source of slave narrative”.
Emotionally, it takes squirming to get used to Douglass poignant recounts of his personal tragic experiences and stories surrounding him, but these stories do build up his emotional appeals and bring sadness to his audience bones. Overall, Douglass Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave was the chemical result of the interaction between an exceptional individual and a still immature society. From a nowadays standpoint, it is doubtlessly best testimony of the period of slavery history.