The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass is a story that features the coercion Fredrick Douglass encountered before his escape to freedom. In his narratives, Douglass offers the readers with fast hand information about the pain, brutality, and humiliation of the slaves. He points out the cruelty of this institution on both the perpetrator, and the victims. As a slave, Fredrick Douglass witnessed the brutalization of the blacks whose only crime was to be born of the wrong color (Cruse 32). He narrates the pain, suffering the slaves went through, and how he fought for his freedom through attaining education.
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Douglass’s escape from slavery and eventual freedom are inseparable from his movingly narrated attainment of literacy. Douglass saw slavery as a dehumanizing institution. In his narratives, he sets an example to the other slaves on insisting upon their humanity to be acknowledged. Douglass refuses to acknowledge anything less than his spiritual, physical, and intellectual freedom. According to Douglass, their masters made academic was not worth to them, they made it hard for them to get literate. The slaves were forbidden from attaining any sort of education for the fear that they will gain insight, and rebel against them. The masters feared that, if the slaves become literate, they will be unmanageable and thus, could not allow them to attain any education.
In his narratives, Douglass reveals a multitude of ways in which African-Americans were mistreated while in slavery. Initially, he never understood the direct meaning about the slave songs, but later on, he was now exposed to the horrors the slaves went through. The strength and academic worth of Douglass has inspired him with anti-slavery tales, and songs. Nevertheless, through literacy, Douglass was able to create a good relationship with fellow slaves, and to serve them since he realized through their songs that they needed him. In addition, he gave lessons to almost forty slaves, at the Freeland's farm, and this improved their lives immeasurably. The majority of the slaves suffered immensely, but were afraid to express it openly; they only did it through songs, and tales as their masters could not understand their native language. Literacy was Douglass's first step on the road to his freedom, and that of his fellow African slaves. In addition, Douglas knew less about the slavery unfairness, until after finding the book The Columbian Orator, which was explaining the cases against slavery. He was angered by what he learnt about this book, and what the masters have done to the slaves. The book made him think that slavery was his fate, and there was no escape from it.
Douglass’s narrative is a courageous work, as it confronts the slavery institution, and the misuse of Christianity by the slave owners to sell fellow human beings. The slaves were not seen as human beings, but as commodities, which led to demeaning them as objects of use. Fredrick Douglass could not stand his humanity being despised; he salvaged his human nature through self-determination, and striving to find education. The knowledge Douglas acquired changed him, and made him understand why the whites acted the way they did. He writes, "I now understood what had been to me a most perplexing difficulty-to wit, the white man's power to enslave the black man" (Douglass, 47). Getting education was his first step to his freedom because he was able to learn the white man’s tricks. He was determined to learn the white man’s knowledge in order to attain his freedom, and that of his fellow Africans (Zinn 201). Douglass says, Douglass says, "From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom" (Douglass, 47). This was after he overhears Mr. Auld reprimanding Mrs. Auld for teaching him how to read. Mr. Auld opened Douglass’s eyes after he was against his wife teaching him, and this made him so determined to obtain education. Mr. Auld made him understand that, education was important for him, and it could help him become independent and stop being inferior as the whites take Africans. Mr. Auld’s words were "If you give a nigger and inch, he will take an ell" (Douglass, 47). This increased his quest for education, since he had learnt that, he needed it to free himself from the institution of slavery. Douglass sought education with all his might. The other master’s had made it impossible for him, but Mrs. Auld began teaching him despite the fact that she was thwarted by her husband that Douglass will become unmanageable, after he enters the world of literacy. Douglass was determined to learn how to read and write on his own, through the white Baltimore street boys.
The journey to freedom for Douglass was not that easy. His journey was just a one man’s journey, and fight for freedom. Douglass paid a price of blood to become educated. This is a price most slaves were unwilling to pay, but he did all he can to access any material that could make him literate. He found the truth and redemption by knowing the truth, and it was only through knowledge. Despite getting knowledge, Douglass at times was mentally tortured for knowing the truth, and wished he had not known because it was harder for him after knowing the truth. He confesses, “I was sometimes prompted to take my life” (887). However, his dreams of becoming a free man came true and he became an abolitionist. In his narrative, Douglass explains how education helped him to recognize the injustices of slavery, and the requisite to escape from this brutal institution. According to Gates and McKay (463), he escaped from what everyone called a nightmare, and he became the first and most famous black abolitionist in the American history. He became a famous abolitionist who gave an account of his life to help the rest of the Africans to overcome fear, and join in the fight against slavery (Gatewood 342). His will to education and gaining confidence to speak openly, helped him in his later life, as he was joined by many organizations in speaking publicly about the evils of slavery. Fredrick Douglas became one of the leading figures in the American Antislavery Society.
One counter argument about the narrative of Fredrick Douglass is that, the apologists insist that the Blacks were subhuman and beasts. The blacks are said to be bad people who mistreated their masters and even poisoned them at times because they were inhuman (Cruse 98). However, Fredrick argues that the blacks were rational humans who were mistreated, and brutalized by their masters. Fredrick explains how the black suffered in the hands of their masters, but fails to explain how the slaves dealt with their masters by beating them up, and stealing from them.
Malcolm X taught himself how to read and write using dictionaries and books on his own while in prison. Just like Fredrick Douglass, his ability to become literate gave him a new light in understanding the world (Waldschmidt 54). He felt like a free man with the education he had received despite the fact that he was in prison. The difference between the two is that Malcolm never wasted the education he received; he started using it immediately compared to Douglass who at most times regretted being literate. Malcolm X says, "I saw that the best thing I could do was acquire hold of a dictionary - to study, to learn some words." (196), he was determined to achieve the ability to read and write. He was happy with his success of being literate as he also confesses that, "in fact, up to then, I never had been so truly free in my life." (Malcolm X). On the other hand, Fredrick spent his time regretting why he got education, and even thought that being literate is being overrated. They both had different views of acquiring education. Malcolm was a letter writer, and he searched for education in order to be able to express himself clearly in his letters. On the other hand, Douglass sought education juts to learn how the slaves were mistreated by their masters. Education was vital to them, but Malcolm X used it immediately, while Douglass was reluctant because, he was not sure if he did the right thing in acquiring it.
Douglass later in life, after the action in Narrative of the Life ends, became a spokesperson who gave a number of speeches about his experiences in slavery. The education he had acquired empowered him into speaking boldly about slavery (McGary and Lawson 102). Through his writings and speeches, many were inspired, and he has been linked to the history of American Philosophy. He became an abolitionist.
Works Cited
Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of an American Slave, Written by himself. New York: Blight, 2003. Print.
McGary, Howard and Lawson, Bill E. Between Slavery and Freedom: Philosophy and American Slavery. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1992. Print.
Gatewood, Willard B. "Frederick Douglass and the Building of a 'Wall of Anti-Slavery Fire', 1845–1846. An Essay Review". The Florida Historical Quarterly 59. 39 (1981): 340–344.
Cruse, Harold. The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual: A Historical Analysis of the Failure of Black Leadership, New York Review Books Classics. New York: New York Review Books, 2005. Print.
Gates, Henry Louis and McKay, Nellie Y. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. Print.
Malcolm X: A Homemade Education. Form the Autobiography of Malcolm X, 1965. PDF File
Zinn, Howard and Arnove. Anthony. Voices of a People's History of the United States. New York City: Seven Stories Press, 2009. Print.
Waldschmidt-Nelson, Britta. Dreams and Nightmares: Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and the Struggle for Black Equality in America (New Perspectives on the History of the South). Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida, 2012. Print.
