Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Uncle Tom's Cabin
"It was impossible to conceive of a human creature more wholly desolate and forlorn than Eliza when she turned her footsteps from Uncle Tom's cabin. Her husband's suffering and dangers, and the danger of her child, all blended in her mind, with a confused and stunning sense of the risk she was running, in leaving the only home she had ever known..." (pg. 243) This is not children's literature. This is not something any child should be reading. This does not give hope or provide a light at the end of the tunnel. This is sad, this is scary, this is reality. Things like this really happened. A child's innocence should not be corrupted with such things. This differs greatly from the themes of the other selections we've read. Gerty, Ellen, and even Capitola are fighting to be good little girls with pretty dresses that make good toast. Eliza is fighting for the life of her child, for the freedom of her child. There is nothing adolescent about this. It is a very adult concept. Slavery is not something that is happy reading. It is not something that is going to have a good prevail. It is putting human beings, like you and I into bondage and treating them like livestock. This selection varies so greatly from anything else, it is almost hard to compare. We think, "Oh poor Ellen... dead mom." Or "Poor Gerty, she's ugly." These people were reduced to nothing more than cattle, and beaten and sold like property. Humans were owning humans. I don't think this was written for children at all... this was written to expose slavery for the evil thing it really was. Society was in for a rude awakening.
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Katelyn,
ReplyDeleteI like your arguments, but could you possibly think that Stowe wrote this novel to show children the harsh sides of slavery? Of course, the novel was wrote to for an older audience, aiming specifically at parents, so that they could relate to Eliza. But these parents read their children this story, hoping to teach them the moral lessons of slavery. Obviously children cannot fully grasp the idea of slavery, but I'm sure it was easier for they to relate to the idea when it was taught through a story.
Great job.
I'd have to agree with you on many points, but I think the story kind of does bring a different since of hope since we can find different characters like senator bird and his wife who do have good hearts. We can also see, I think a central theme between the love Mrs. Bird has for children and the love Eliza has for her child. I think that you have to look very hard to find hope in such a bleak setting but it seems a few characters were able to find it none the less. Very though provoking and good post!
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