Summary Of Endurance By Octavia Butler

5) In opposition to general characterization, Margaret Weylin is perceptually portrayed through Dana’s filtered perspective as opposed to an unedited observational eye. This time accompanied by Kevin, Dana is transported to the Weylin plantation where Rufus had fallen from a tree and laid beside a young slave named Nigel. Flash forward to sending medical help and carrying Rufus to his bedroom, Dana found herself in the red-haired boy’s room per his request, only for a screeching interruption to disturb their peace. “‘You’re to go out to the cookhouse and get some supper!’ she told me as I got out of her way. But she made it sound as though she were saying, ‘You’re to go straight to hell!’” Words, although crucial when communicating, are

Douglass not only describes slaves as animals, but he describes slave treatment as if they were animals to further describe the horrendous lives of slaves. Slaves were fed food in troughs (36). By choosing the word “trough”, Douglass emphasizes the poor treatment of slaves; slaves were not good enough to be fed from bowls or plates, they were no better than animals. Douglass also compares women on the plantations to breeding animals. Women were expected to reproduce in order to increase their masters’ wealth, not to create a family. Women and children were separated before the child was a year old so they would not form familial bonds with one another. When Douglass’ own mother died, he compared it to a stranger dying because he had no connection with her (18). Slaves were not only thought of animals, but also fostered as animals. Douglass describes Mr. Covey as a “nigger-breaker”, Douglass was broken in “body, soul, and spirit” by

The film reminds us that “slavery and its aftermath involved the emasculation-physical as well as psychological - of black men, the drive for black power was usually taken to mean a call for black male power, despite the needs of (and often with the complicity of) black women. That continues to result in the devaluing of black female contributions to the liberation struggle and in the subordination of black women in general.”4

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.

People today still question about how any slave had the motivation to keep doing the normal habits that they had. As, children slaves aren’t allowed to read, write,or even talk correctly. How is it that some have the drive to go behind their owner’s back to do some of these things? Butler, explains this drive by giving us the main character of the book named Dana in her novel, Kindred.

  “Slavery proved as injurious to her as it did to me. When I went there, she was a pious, warm, and tender-hearted woman. There was no sorrow or suffering for which she had not a tear. She had bread for the hungry, clothes for the naked, and comfort for every mourner that came within her reach. Slavery soon proved its ability to divest her of these heavenly qualities. Under its influence, the tender heart became stone, and the lamblike disposition gave way to one of tiger-like fierceness.”

According to Frederick Douglass, “it was the blood-stained gate, the entrance to the hell of slavery, through which I was about to pass. It was a most terrible spectacle. I wish I could commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld it (p.4).” Frederick Douglass and Toni Morrison literatures examine the stigma of slavery, and the perceptions of its dangers. They illustrate what life was like and the mental as well social impact it had on enslaved African-Americans and their life after gaining freedom. Richard Wright convinces his audience in Black Boy that he was tired of the limitations and outcries in the South “I was not leaving the South to forget the South, but so that some day I might understand it, might come to know what its rigors had done to me, its children (284).” Alice Walker obtains her readers attention by transforming young women into their own characters with a voice using spiritual guidance. In Native Son, Bigger has achieved is lost after being apprehended and brought into captivity, as he transitions back into silence and passivity and begins to recover only in his final confrontation, whereas Douglass in the same prevailing convention, only heals after the regaining of his freedom. Through these literatures, and many others, African-Americans find multiple ways to alleviate and recover from the intensity of undesired bondage and bigotry.

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.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, brings to light many of the social injustices that colored men, women, and children all were forced to endure throughout the nineteenth century under Southern slavery laws. Douglass's life-story is presented in a way that creates a compelling argument against the justification of slavery. His argument is reinforced though a variety of anecdotes, many of which detailed strikingly bloody, horrific scenes and inhumane cruelty on the part of the slaveholders. Yet, while Douglas’s narrative describes in vivid detail his experiences of life as a slave, what Douglass intends for his readers to grasp after reading his narrative is something much more profound. Aside from all the

After discovering the reading of four writers on slavery, I have learned new and exciting information about the institution of slavery. Throughout this paper I intend to inform you of there thoughts and actions and how I perceived them. I also intend to analyze how the lifestyle and upbringing of these writers affected their writing. Being able to uncover what these readings mean has been both challenging and rewarding.

When Dana returns from living as a slave in the Antebellum South, she identifies with accounts of survivors from the Holocaust during World War II. She compares the horrible acts of the Nazis to the behavior of slave holders who worked at every turn to demean enslaved people and lessen their humanity. While the monstrosities of the Holocaust may have been more intense over a shorter period of time, Butler points out that those who lived through slavery endured conditions just as horrible over a much longer duration. Yet while Americans are largely comfortable acknowledging the events of the Holocaust as the worst impulses of mankind, there is often more hesitancy to take responsibility for the degradations of enslaved people that took place

Hughes’s descriptive writing prompts the reader to visualize strong images of oppression in America. The speaker provides an image of an extremely suppressed group of people in the statement: “I am the red man driven from the land” (Hughes 21). This simple phrase creates a picture of the Native Americans being driven from their lands and forced to live on undesirable land, and, as a result, this invites the reader to acknowledge their severe oppression. Similarly, the speaker mentions the people who were “torn from Black Africa’s strand” (Hughes 50). This generates an image of boats packed with a depressing amount of broken people, waiting to be sold into slavery. These visual examples portray the severity of the situation that many Americans found themselves in. These

(Intro)The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave is an account of Frederick Douglass’ life of hardship as a slave who suffered due to a cruel institution which during his life was legal, but eventually found his freedom by fleeing to a free state. Frederick Douglass shows the reader what life was like during the antebellum period of the United States and how harshly some treated the enslaved, which not only bonded their bodies but also their minds. Within his narrative we see the detrimental consequences of African slavery towards individuals and the African family as a whole. He also exposes how the institution of slavery corrupts not only the enslaved but also those who willingly choose to participate in this foul practice, turning once kind hearted individuals into cold, cruel, hollow shells of whom they use to be. Douglass not only used his narrative to tell the story of his life, but also as a tool of propaganda to inform others of the horrors of slavery, and to dismiss the claims of others as to the need of slavery in the United States of America. (Thesis)Frederick Douglass’ narrative shows the reader what life was like for a slave in the antebellum period of America and how the harsh treatment of the enslaved not only effected their bodies but also the minds of the captives. Within Douglass’ narrative we also see how slavery effected the African American family, how slavery corrupts not only the enslaved but also the slaveholders involved

Overall, the speaker of “The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point” reminds us that the system of slavery destroys lives. We see this notion play out in the narrative as the speaker talks of a female slave at Plymouth Rock. Here, we bear witness to her lack of respect for life that not only flaws her judgments as a mother, but perpetuates a sense of violence or

Douglass gives detailed anecdotes of his and others experience with the institution of slavery to reveal the hidden horrors. He includes personal accounts he received while under the control of multiple different masters. He analyzes the story of his wife’s cousin’s death to provide a symbol of outrage due to the unfairness of the murderer’s freedom. He states, “The offence for which this girl was thus murdered was this: She had been set that night to mind Mrs. Hicks’s baby, and during the night she fell asleep, and the baby cried.” This anecdote, among many others, is helpful in persuading the reader to understand the severity of rule slaveholders hold above their slaves. This strategy displays the idea that slaves were seen as property and could be discarded easily.