Analysis Of The Book 'The Book Of Negroes'

My verbal visual essay is based on the novel The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill. The aspect of the novel I decided to focus on is the protagonist, Amniata Diallo. To begin with, the focal point of this piece is a woman 's face with a map of the world on it. I attempted to draw the face with a likeliness to Amniata in mind, by incorporating the moon marks that are adorned on her face. As well as her facial expression is rather difficult to read. From the beginning of novel, Amniata says; "My eyes are hard to read, and I like them so"(8). She takes it great care in concealing her emotions. Following that, the map is supposed to symbolize Amanita 's travels. Amniata has lived in numerous places. She not only sailed from Africa to America,

This is supposed to represent Amanita 's confusion she developed towards her identity. In Africa where Amniata was born, she was free. She had no one controlling her whatsoever. However that all disappeared once she arrived in South Carolina. Amniata struggled to comprehend who she was and what she had become for a long time after she arrived on Appleby 's plantation . She soon learned that she was no longer her own person, but was property . Her virginity, body, and even her children were not her own. She was being referred to as an African ,Negro, and Slave people couldn 't even pronounce her name she was now "Meena" not Amniata. Nobody ever her heard of her village. Essentially, the girl from the Bayo daughter of Mamadu Diallo and Sira Kulibali no longer existed in this new life , in the novel she says “That, I decided, was what it meant to be a slave: your past didn’t matter; in the present you were invisible and you had no claim on the future”( ). Ultimately , this lead to Amniata being very conflicted. She no longer could refer to her past, her present was not in her control and her future was one of great uncertainty. She did not understand how to regard herself, if she herself did not know, then who really was