Incidents In the Life of a Slave Girl
No one in today’s society can even come close to the heartache, torment, anguish, and complete misery suffered by women in slavery. Many women endured this agony their entire lives, there only joy being there children and families, who were torn away from them and sold, never to be seen or heard from again.
Thesis
In the book, Incidents in the Life of Slave Girl, Linda Brent tells a spectacular story of her twenty years spent in slavery with her master Dr. Flint, and her jealous Mistress. She speaks of her trials and triumphs as well as the harms done to other slaves. She takes you on the inside of slavery and shows you the Hell on Earth slavery really was. She tells you the love and heartbreak she experienced being an unmarried slave mother. At around the age of twenty or so, Linda escapes and ends up in very small garret only nine foot long and seven foot wide. So small she could not even stand up. She lived in this hole with no light, no fresh air, and barely ever moved for almost seven years. She finally escaped and made it to the North where she and her children lived much happier and most of all they lived free.
Linda Brent said, "Slavery is terrible for men, but is far more terrible for women." She makes a good and true point, for when her life and the life of other slave women is compared to men’s, mentally, slavery takes a much larger toll on the suffering of women. Women are responsible for their children, because the children follow the mother and mothers often fill guilty for bringing children into the cruel world of slavery. As Linda Brent expresses, "I often prayed for death; but now I didn’t want to die, unless my child could die too . . .(Benny) it’s clinging fondness was a mixture of love and pain . . . Sometimes I wished that he (Benny) might die in infancy . . .Death is better than slavery". In the book Linda has mixed feelings about her children because she so dearly loves them. She doesn’t want them to suffer in slavery as she has so she wishes they would die, but she loves them and she doesn’t want to lose them as many slave mothers had. How torn and incapable she must have felt as a slave mother. Linda also speaks of "The Slaves New Year’s Day", this was the time that slaves everywhere were sold and leased. Many mothers were torn from their husbands and their children. Linda speak...
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...or her mistress, Mrs. Dodge, whom she’d heard had been very low of funds and needed Linda simply to get some money. Sure enough she showed up, Linda ran with the baby she nursed to California to stay with her brother. Benny was learning a trade with her brother and Ellen was in boarding school. At last her dear friend Mrs. Bruce bought her for three-hundred dollars. The Dodge’s were so certain they’d never find her and so low on finances that they probably would have sold her for anything. At last Linda and her children were free. Never to become captured by the Fugitive Slave Law. Never to have to look over their shoulder for someone that might know them and turn them in. What a relief that must have been after living such a long life as a fugitive slave and poor slave mother.
As you could see Ms. Linda Brent was a very strong woman who’s love for her children and determination for them not to live the horrible slave life she had made her and her children free. Free to what though? Freedom just to say that they weren’t a piece of property. Freedom to build and live in their own home and raise a family without fear that any person might take that happiness away at any moment.
The black women’s interaction with her oppressive environment during Revolutionary period or the antebellum America was the only way of her survival. Playing her role, and being part of her community that is not always pleasant takes a lot of courage, and optimism for better tomorrow. The autonomy of a slave women still existed even if most of her natural rights were taken. As opposed to her counterparts
From 1813 to 1879, lived a woman of great dignity, strong will, and one desire. A woman who was considered nothing more than just a slave girl would give anything for the freedom for herself and her two children. Harriet Jacobs, who used the pen name Linda Brent, compiled her life into a little book called Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Mrs. Jacobs' story, once read, will leave nothing but pity and heart ache for her readers as they discover the life she had to endure. She however boldly states, "[I] earnestly desire to arouse the women of the North to a realizing sense of the condition of two millions of women at the South still in bondage, suffering what I suffered, and most of them far worse. I want to add my testimony to that of abler pens to convince the people of the Free States what Slavery really is."(preface 1) Harriet Jacobs wanted to show the people who were not experiencing slavery exactly was going on in hopes that it would influence them to bring a stop to it. Though you cannot help but pity Harriet Jacobs, you can also take her story and the hard ships she endured and realize how strong a woman she truly was.
When she discovers that Benny and Ellen are to receive similar treatment, Linda hatches a desperate plan. Escaping to the North with two small children would be impossible. Unwilling to submit to Dr. Flint's abuse, but equally unwilling to abandon her family, she hides in the attic crawl space in the house of her grandmother, Aunt Martha. She hopes that Dr. Flint, under the false impression that she has gone North, will sell her children rather than risk having them disappear as well. Linda is overjoyed when Dr. Flint sells Benny and Ellen to a slave trader who is secretly representing Mr. Sands.
In Linda Brent’s Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Brent’s grandmother showed her compassion by giving her a place she could call home. Her grandmother provided a place in her desperate hours of needs; she had to hide from her slave owners at her grandmother’s house. Even though the home was a hiding place with horrible living conditions, Brent preferred it over slavery, as she stated, "It seemed horrible to sit or lie in a cramped position day after day, without gl...
To understand the desperation of wanting to obtain freedom at any cost, it is necessary to take a look into what the conditions and lives were like of slaves. It is no secret that African-American slaves received cruel and inhumane treatment. Although she wrote of the horrific afflictions experienced by slaves, Linda Brent said, “No pen can give adequate description of the all-pervading corruption produced by slavery." The life of a slave was never a satisfactory one, but it all depended on the plantation that one lived on and the mast...
In her book, Jubilee, Margaret Walker tells the story of slavery from American history, based on real narrative from her family. Walker’s real great-grandmother, Vyry, was born to Hetta as her youngest child with Masters John Morris Dutton. Vyry was two years old, when Hetta died. Mammy Sukey took care of Vyry until the day she left to the Big House. Seven year old Vyry began her duty in Masters House; however, Big Missy Salina, John’s wife hated her and bullied her for she knew her husband cheated on her with Hetta. Master John found out how Salina mistreated Vyry; thus, he changed Vyry’s duties to work in the kitchen under the command of Aunt Sally. During the time spend with Sally, Vyry learned a lot about cooking, food preserving and herbs using, which enormously helped her later in her life. Because of her cooking skills, which she gained during work with Sally, Vyry became the main cook after Sally was sold away and stayed in the Big House kitchen till the day of emancipation. Throughout the years of her service, Vyry met a free black man Randal Ware, who imposed her the idea of freedom, saying he can buy it for her. Neither Master John nor his wife want to set Vyry free, thus she stayed in slavery with her two children. Ware had a plan of escape for her, but Vyry didn’t want to leave without children, got caught, and punished. The years of Civil War came, Ware was gone, and Masters family started dying out. Finally, only Miss Lillian, who was losing her mind after head injury, stayed alive, when the war ended and emancipation was brought. Vyry, alone with her children and a new man she met – Innis Brown, had to leave the Big House and start a new life. There were many obstacles they had to overcome. Although being free, it...
In her essay, “Loopholes of Resistance,” Michelle Burnham argues that “Aunt Marthy’s garret does not offer a retreat from the oppressive conditions of slavery – as, one might argue, the communal life in Aunt Marthy’s house does – so much as it enacts a repetition of them…[Thus] Harriet Jacobs escapes reigning discourses in structures only in the very process of affirming them” (289). In order to support this, one must first agree that Aunt Marthy’s house provides a retreat from slavery. I do not. Burnham seems to view the life inside Aunt Marthy’s house as one outside of and apart from slavery where family structure can exist, the mind can find some rest, comfort can be given, and a sense of peace and humanity can be achieved. In contrast, Burnham views the garret as a physical embodiment of the horrors of slavery, a place where family can only dream about being together, the mind is subjected to psychological warfare, comfort is non-existent, and only the fear and apprehension of inhumanity can be found. It is true that Aunt Marthy’s house paints and entirely different, much less severe, picture of slavery than that of the garret, but still, it is a picture of slavery differing only in that it temporarily masks the harsh realities of slavery whereas the garret openly portrays them. The garret’s close proximity to the house is symbolic of the ever-lurking presence of slavery and its power to break down and destroy families and lives until there is nothing left. Throughout her novel, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs presents these and several other structures that suggest a possible retreat from slavery, may appear from the outside to provide such a retreat, but ideally never can. Among these structures are religion, literacy, family, self, and freedom.
This means that Linda wants to escape from slavery, but because of Aunt Martha putting guilt trips on Linda, this hurts there relationship. Linda I believe resents her grandmother for this, but Aunt Martha believes that she is doing the right thing for her. Aunt Martha represents the role of mother and father figure by providing reinforcement to Linda. Because of Aunt Martha is a free woman she can provide many things to her granddaughter in times in need. Because of Linda and Aunt Martha complex relationship, Linda says, “Although my grandmother was all in all to me, I feared her as well loved her. I had been accustomed to look up at her with a respect bordering upon awe” (Jacobs 28-29). The fear that Linda has with Aunt Martha gives her trouble telling her about Dr. Flint advances which leads to a major conflict. “As a young slave girl of fifteen years, Linda if forced to choose between the virtues instilled by her much respected Grandmother and her need to assert herself sexually to avoid father enslavement”
In Harriett Jacobs’s book, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, she informs her readers of her life as a slave girl growing up in southern America. By doing this she hides her identity and is referred to as Linda Brent which she had a motive for her secrecy? In the beginning of her life she is sheltered as a child by her loving mistress where she lived a free blissful life. However after her mistress dies she is not freed from the bondage of slaver but given to her mistress sister and this is where Jacobs’s happiness dissolved. In her story, she reveals that slavery is terrible for men but, is more so dreadful for women. In addition woman bore being raped by their masters, as well as their children begin sold into slavery. All of this experience
Slavery is a term that can create a whirlwind of emotions for everyone. During the hardships faced by the African Americans, hundreds of accounts were documented. Harriet Jacobs, Charles Ball and Kate Drumgoold each shared their perspectives of being caught up in the world of slavery. There were reoccurring themes throughout the books as well as varying angles that each author either left out or never experienced. Taking two women’s views as well as a man’s, we can begin to delve deeper into what their everyday lives would have been like.
Many women are born with a maternal instinct. This instinct surpasses all other emotions. As soon as a child is born she will give her life for that child and devote her life to the safety of her child. Slavery complicates this. Mothers had no control over what happened to their children; they were helpless. Mothers watched their children beaten and raped. They were forced to bear the children of their master. They raised children that were born from that pain and torture and knew that child would have the same life. Slaves wished for what they thought was best for their children: death. It is inconceivable for a modern...
In conclusion, women were considered property and slave holders treated them as they pleased. We come to understand that there was no law that gave protection to female slaves. Harriet Jacob’s narrative shows the true face of how slaveholders treated young female slave. The female slaves were sexually exploited which damaged them physically and psychologically. Furthermore it details how the slave holder violated the most sacred commandment of nature by corrupting the self respect and virtue of the female slave. Harriet Jacob writes this narrative not to ask for pity or to be sympathized but rather to show the white people to be aware of how female slaves constantly faced sexual exploitation which damaged their body and soul.
The issue of Slavery in the South was an unresolved issue in the United States during the seventeenth and eighteenth century. During these years, the south kept having slavery, even though most states had slavery abolished. Due to the fact that slaves were treated as inferior, they did not have the same rights and their chances of becoming an educated person were almost impossible. However, some information about slavery, from the slaves’ point of view, has been saved. In this essay, we are comparing two different books that show us what being a slave actually was. This will be seen with the help of two different characters: Linda Brent in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and Frederick Douglass in The Narrative of the life of Frederick
In chapter one she explains through her narrative Linda Brent her childhood. Before she realized she was a slave; her father was a carpenter who is granted many privileges of a free man because of his excellent
Despite Flint’s overtures, Linda is able to avoid being by the grace of her own intellect. Although her actions may seem illicit and ill-advised, like her love affair with Mr. Sands to fend off Dr. Flint, so are the repercussions if she cooperates and does nothing. Jacobs predicates that slaves suffer from the influence of the slave system on their moral development. In the text, it is evident that Linda does not condemn slaves for illegal or immoral acts such as theft or adultery, but rather saying that they usually have no other option but to behave this way. However, she also points out that slaves have no reason to develop a strong ethical sense, as they are given no ownership of themselves or final control over their actions. This is not their fault, but the fault of the slavery system that dehumanizes them. “Pity me, and pardon me, O virtuous reader! You never knew what it is to be a slave; to be entirely unprotected by law or custom; to have the laws reduce you to the condition of a chattel, entirely subject to the will of another” (Jacobs 49). Slaves are not evil like their masters, but important parts of their personalities are left undeveloped. She argues that a powerless slave girl cannot be held to the same standards of morality as a free