Revolt or Surrender

Summary

Uncle Tom, a slave on theShelbyplantation, is loved by his owners, their son, and every slave on the property. He lives contentedly with his wife and children in their own cabin until Mr. Shelby, deeply in debt to a slave trader named Haley, agrees to sell Tom and Harry, the child of his wife’s servant Eliza. Tom is devastated but vows that he will not run away, as he believes that to do so would plunge his master so far into debt that he would be forced to sell every slave.

 

Just before Tom is taken away, Mrs. Shelby promises him that she will buy him back as soon as she can gather the funds. Tom is sold to Haley, who eventually sells him to a kindly master named Mr. St. Clare.

 

  Eliza, however, cannot bear to part with her son and escapes the night before he is to be taken from her. She escapes successfully and makes her way to a Quaker village, with a family that harbors slaves. There, she is reunited with her husband George, who lived on a neighboring plantation and has also escaped to flee his master’s cruelty. The couple and their son spend a night with the Quaker family before returning to the Underground Railroad.

 

Tom befriends his new master and especially his young daughter Eva, who shares Tom’s deep religious faith and devotion. Eva abhors cruelty and eventually is so overcome with grief over slavery that when she becomes ill, she accepts her impending death peacefully and tells her family and their servants that she is happy knowing that she is going to heaven, where such cruelty does not exist. St. Clare begins to confront the realization that he believes slavery is evil, and he promises Tom that he will fill out forms guaranteeing his freedom in the event of St. Clare’s death.

 

Shortly after Eva dies, her father dies tragically in an accident, and Tom’s fate is left entirely in the hands of Marie, St. Clare’s selfish and unsympathetic wife. Marie decides to move back to her parents’ estate and to sell all the slaves, despite Miss Ophelia’s exhortation that Marie should fulfill St. Clare’s promise to give Tom his freedom. Marie refuses, and just before he is sold, he writes a letter to theShelbys(with the help of Mr. Legree) telling them his plight and asking for their help. The letter goes unanswered, and Tom ends up in the hands of Simon Legree, an evil and bitter plantation owner whose philosophy is to work his slaves hard and replace them when they inevitably die just a few years later.

 

On Legree’s plantation, Tom meets two fellow slaves, Emmeline and Cassy. Emmeline is a young mulatto woman sold to Legree at the same time as Tom, and she attempts to befriend the embittered Cassy, who has suffered at the hands of Legree for several years. Cassy has seen her children sold and is so destitute that Tom’s pleas that she put her faith and trust in God fall on deaf ears. Legree soon comes to hate Tom after Tom refuses to beat and discipline the other slaves. Legree had planned to turn Tom into a brutal overseer, and when he realizes that Tom will not participate in cruelty, he becomes enraged and takes out his wrath on Tom. Tom becomes discouraged until he has a vision of heaven one night as he is drifting off to sleep. The vision reinvigorates him, and he decides it is his mission to suffer for the other slaves. He regularly fills their cotton baskets at the expense of his own, gives them his food and water, and reads the Bible to them.

 

Tom’s acts of kindness enrage Legree, and when Emmeline and Cassy escape, he demands that Tom tell him everything he knows. Tom admits that he knew of their plans to escape and is aware of their whereabouts, but he refuses to disclose where they are. Legree beats Tom so severely that after a few days, he dies.

 

Cassy and Emmeline eventually escape, and they happen to wind up on the same northern-bound ferry as George Shelby, who is rooming next to a woman named Madame de Thoux. Through conversation, it is discovered that Eliza Harris is Cassy’s daughter, and George Harris is Madame de Thoux’s brother. Cassy and Madame de Thoux journey together toCanada, where they are reunited with their family. Madame de Thoux reveals that her husband has left her a large inheritance, and they all move toFrancetogether, where George is educated. The family then relocates toAfrica, and Cassy’s long-lost son, who has been traced, joins them. Topsy moves with Miss Ophelia to New England, then moves toAfricato work as a missionary. George Shelby gives all the servants on theShelbyfarm their freedom, and tells them to be Christians and to think of Tom.

 

Brief introduction of the writer

Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896), American writer and philanthropist, best-known for the anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1851-52). The book was quickly translated into 37 languages and it sold in five years over half a million copies in theUnited States.

 

Harriet Beecher Stowe was born on June 14, 1811, inLitchfield,Connecticut, and brought up with puritanical strictness. She had one sister and six brothers. Her father, Lyman Beecher, was a controversial Calvinist preacher. Stowe’s mother died when she was four. When she was eleven years old, she entered the seminary atHartford,Connecticut, kept by her elder sister. Four years later she was employed as assistant teacher.

 

In 1834 Stowe began her literary career when she won a prize contest of the Western Monthly Magazine, and soon she was a regular contributor of stories and essays. Her first book, The Mayflower, appeared in 1843.

 

In 1836 Stowe married Calvin E. Stowe, a professor at her father’s theological seminary. The early years of their marriage were marked by poverty. Over the next 14 years Stowe had 7 children. In 1850 Calvin Stowe was offered a professorship at Bowdoin, and they moved toBrunswick,Maine. In Cincinnati Stowe had come in contact with fugitive slaves. She learned about life in the South from her own visits there and saw how cruel slavery was. These experiences led Stowe to compose her famous novel, which was first published in the anti-slavery newspaper The National Era and later in book form.

 

Stowe started to publish her writings in The Atlantic Monthly and later in the Independent and in Christian Union. In 1853, 1856, and 1859 Stowe made journeys toEuropeand became friends with George Eliot, Elisabeth Barrett Browning, and Lady Byron. However, British public opinion turned against her when she charged Lord Byron with incestuous relations with his half-sister in Lady Byron Vindicated (1870).

 

Attacks on the veracity of her portrayal of the South led Stowe to publish The Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1853), in which she presented her source material. A second anti-slavery novel, Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (1856), told the story of a dramatic attempt at slave rebellion. Stowe’s later works did not gain the same popularity as Uncle Tom’s Cabin . She published novels, studies of social life, essays, and a small volume of religious poems. Pearl of Orr’s Island (1862), Old-Town Folks (1869) and her last novel Poganuc People (1878) were partly based on her husband’s childhood reminiscences and are among the first examples of local color writing inNew England.

 

Stowe’s mental faculties failed in 1888, two years after the death of her husband. She died on July 1,1896 inHartford,Connecticut.

 

 

 

Main characters of the story

The main characters in this story are Uncle Tom, Eliza and George Harris.

Uncle Tom is a pious, trustworthy, slave. He never wrongs anyone and always obeys his master. A very spiritual person, Uncle Tom tries his best to obey the Bible and to do what is right. Eliza is a beautiful slave owned by George Shelby, Sr., the same person who initially owns Tom. Eliza has a son, Harry. Eliza’s husband, George Harris, lives on a nearby plantation. George is a brilliant man, and invented a machine that was used in the factory he works in. His owner became jealous and demoted George from his factory job to doing hard labor on the plantation. Setting: These stories takes place throughout the states ofKentuckyandMississippiin the year1891 inthe Plantations and fields and workshops are were the slaves work mostly in sunny and good working conditions.

Chapters 1-5 because hisKentuckyplantation was overwhelmed by debt, George Shelby, Sr. makes plans to trade some slaves to a slave dealer named Haley in exchange for debts being canceled. The dealer selects Uncle Tom as payment for the debt. While the two are discussing the possible transaction, Eliza’s son, Harry, comes rushing into the room. Haley decides he wants to take Harry also, butShelbyrefuses to part with the child. Eliza, overhearing part of the conversation, is frightened and confides her fears to her husband, George Harris. The fact that George’s owner is mistreating him, combined with a possible sale of his son persuades George to begin planning to run away. After inferring from an overheard conversation between Mrs. Shelby and Mr. Shelby that they are indeed going to sell Harry and Uncle Tom, Eliza warns Tom and she runs away.

Chapters 6-15 Eliza is able to cross theOhio Riverand get to a safe place before Haley’s two hired slave-catchers can catch up with her. Although he was warned, Uncle Tom stays on the plantation, leaving it up to God to protect him. At the same time, George Harris begins his escape. Disguised as a Spaniard, George takes his time finding a route on the Underground Railroad. He just happens to go to the same place where Eliza and Harry are being hidden. The family is finally united at a Quaker Settlement. Uncle Tom, meanwhile, is on a boat en route toNew Orleans. After gallantly saving the life of young Eva St. Clare, he is rewarded by being bought by her father, Augustine. Augustine is married to a selfish woman who claims to be sick and takes no interest in her daughter. So it is on his return trip fromMainewhere he has picked up his cousin Ophelia who will care for Eva that Augustine buys Tom.

Chapters 16-30 Unused to Southern customs and slavery, Ophelia tries to bring order to the St. Claire plantation, but the pampered slaves do not cooperate. Eva, who has always been frail, was dying and asks her father to free his slaves. After her death, Augustine was making plans to free the slaves when he was killed while breaking up a fight. Mrs. St. Clare had no intentions of freeing any slaves and had Uncle Tom sold at an auction to a brutal plantation owner named Simon Legree.

Chapters 31-40 For weeks, Uncle Tom tries in vain to please his new master. Legree has enough of Tom’s good heartedness after Tom was ordered to beat another female slave and refused. For this show of abstinence, Tom was beaten until he fainted. A slave woman named Cassy helps treat Tom’s wounds and afterwards went to Legree’s apartment to torment him. Legree is superstitious and believes that Cassy would cast an evil spell on him, and as a result, he was afraid of her. Haunting by the guilty secrets, Legree drinks until he falls asleep. Soon, Cassy along with another slave, Emmeline, run away from the plantation. Convinced that Tom knows something about it, Legree again has him beat until he can’t speak or stand.

Chapters 41-45 Two days later, George Shelby, Jr. arrives at Legree’s plantation to buy Tom back, but it is too late. Uncle Tom is dying, and at his death, Shelby Jr. determines to free all his slaves. He then helps Cassy and Emmeline escape. Later, on a river boat headed north, they meet Madame de Thoux whom they find out is George Harris’ sister. Upon discussing this, they also discover that Cassy is Eliza’s mother. The two women go toCanadawhere Eliza, George and Harry had settled. Finally, the family is united. Uncle Tom’s Cabin helped to turn the tide of public opinion against slavery in the 19th century. After View: This controversial novel was initially written to question slavery and to convince people of its wrongness. It was the first book that brought the problem of Negro slavery inAmericato the attention of the world. It became not only a bestseller, but a social documentary of the lives of slaves. While living inOhiojust across the river from slave holdingKentucky, Harriet Beecher Stowe had a first hand view of terrified runaway slaves and cruel bounty hunters. After moving back toNew England, she decided to write a book about what she had seen. At one point she said, My heart was bursting with the anguish excited by the cruelty and injustice our nation was showing to the slave, and praying God to let me do a little and cause my cry for them to be heard.1 Mrs. Stowe’s cry was heard very loudly in her book that criticized slavery and counted slavery as a national sin. She hoped her novel would bring slavery to a quick and peaceful end, however it only increased northern hostility towards the South.

 

 

Straight matter

My first reaction to this book is that it was based much more on religion than I had imagined it to be. As I expected, Stowe’s main purpose of the book was to nakedly expose the institution of slavery toAmericaand the rest of the world with the hopes that something would be done about it. To achieve this purpose, she showed us individual instances of slavery in a country that prided itself on its Christianity and its laws protecting freedom. She showed us how absurd slavery is “beneath the shadow of American laws and the shadow of the cross of Christ.”

 

I was also surprised at the various kinds of relationships between whites and blacks of the South. We learn that not all whites were bad and not all blacks were good, but that there were quite a mixture of characters and relationships. That was strength of the book. It’s not a melodrama, but shows an evil institution which allows both good and evil and all those in between to exist under it, and how this institution affects the individuals. Legree’s plantation, for instance, corrupted anyone who came there. But the reader understands that it is the system that allows this which is the root of the problem, and that, by the way is a North/South problem, not just a Southern problem. She specifically calls on the North at the end of the book to ask them if they can live with the institution of slavery in their country and still call themselves Christians, a wise move.

 

One of the most memorable characters was, of course, Eva. Stowe was able to give her a true, simple, child’s voice which spoke unadulterated truth about the relations and happenings around her:

 

“Poor old Prue’s child was all that she had,–and yet she had to hear it crying, and she couldn’t help it! Papa, these poor creatures love their children as much as you do me. O! do something for them! There’s poor Mammy loves her children have seen her cry when she talked about them. And Tom loves his children; and it’s dreadful, papa, that such things are happening, all the time!”

 

You can’t help but say, “Oh, my god, she’s right you know!” Eva’s is a powerful voice in this book. But Eva’s Jesus-like gathering of the slaves before she died was a bit much in its reference to Jesus. How old was Eva?  Are these the words of a little kid?

 

“I sent for you all, my dear friends,” said Eva, “because I love you. I love you all; and I have something to say to you, which I want you always to remember . . . . I am going to leave you. In a few more weeks, you will see me no more–“

 

The character Eva seemed to be an innocent child telling her family and the world about how she saw slavery which exposed a lot of its evils. But when she turned into a mini Jesus and preached to the slaves before her death as Jesus had preached the disciples before his death, I felt the author had given to too great of a “jump into maturity ” to be believable, unless the short life of Eva was really supposed to be a real miracle occurrences. Eva was powerful enough as a real character that looks at slavery from innocent eyes. Her transfiguration into a holy person at the end took some of her punch away.

 

As a Jesus-character, Tom transcends the book as a Christian hero. An interesting study would be a comparison of Tom and Jesus. One direct parallel, for instance, is the direct temptation that Legree put upon Tom to break him and make him give up his religion for Legree’s “church.” It parallels to the temptation of Jesus by Satan in the desert.

 

An important question asked throughout the book was “If we emancipate, are we willing to educate?” In her essay at the end, Stowe chides those white Americans who feel they are doing the slaves a favor by sending them back to Africa so that they can live in the supposedly free country ofLiberia. She directly asks the reader, “Would you be willing to take a slave into your Christian home and educate him?” This question went right into every household in the North.

 

A short introduction at the beginning of my book asked the question whether or not it was “good literary style” for Stowe to talk directly to the reader in the book. I don’t think Stowe was trying to create literary work of art other than would serve her purpose of communicating to the reader what exactly slavery was inAmericaat that time. She wrote the book so that she could talk directly to the reader. It may not be good literary style but it reminds the reader that “this books for you.”

 

If you want to look at this book in terms of an interesting piece of literature outside its social and political context, I don’t think you have much to look at. The story itself is not interesting (the escape plan of Cassy was the high point), it’s packed with religious dogma at every turn (borders on Puritan literature), and you don’t see hardly any character development except perhaps for Augustine, but he is so wish washy that his conversion right before his death doesn’t give you any insights into his character or human nature. This book is simply expository: it uncovers the institution of slavery. This is what makes the book riveting to read.

 

Stowe seems to have seen quite a number of individual incidents of slavery for her to be able to write powerful and moving scenes like this one in which the slave George gives Mr. Wilson, a former humane owner, the view of slavery in America from the slave’s point of view. This speech by George was the most powerful in the book:

 

“See here, now, Mr. Wilson,” said George, coming up and sitting himself determinately down in front of him; “look at me, now. Don’t I sit before you, every way, just as much a man as you are? Look at my face,–look at my body,” and the young man drew himself up proudly; “why am I not a man, as much as anybody? Well, Mr. Wilson, hear what I can tell you. I had a father–one of yourKentuckygentlemen–who didn’t think enough of me to keep me from being sold with his dogs and horses, to satisfy the estate, when he died. I saw my mother put up at sheriff’s sale, with her seven children. They were sold before her eyes, one by one, all to different masters; and I was the youngest. She came and kneeled down before old Mas’r, and begged him to buy her with me, that she might have at least one child with her; and he kicked her away with his heavy boot. I saw him do it; and the last that I heard was her moans and screams, when I was tied to his horse’s neck, to be carried off to his place.”

“Well, then?”

“My master traded with one of the men, and bought my oldest sister. She was a pious, good girl,–a member of theBaptistChurch,–and as handsome as my poor mother had been. She was well brought up, and had good manners. At first, I was glad she was bought, for I had one friend near me. I was soon sorry for it. Sir, I have stood at the door and heard her whipped, when it seemed as if every blow cut into my naked heart, and I couldn’t do anything to help her; and she was whipped, sir, for wanting to live a decent Christian life, such as your laws give no slave girl a right to live; and at last I saw her chained with a trader’s gang, to be sent to market in Orleans,–sent there for nothing else but that,–and that’s the last I know of her. Well, I grew up,–long years and years,–no father, no mother, no sister, not a living soul that cared for me more than a dog; nothing but whipping, scolding, starving. Why, sir, I’ve been so hungry that I have been glad to take the bones they threw to their dogs; and yet, when I was a little follow, and laid awake whole nights and cried, it wasn’t the hunger, it wasn’t the whipping, I cried for. No, sir; it was for my mother and my sisters.–It was because I hadn’t a friend to love me on earth. I never knew what peace or comfort was. I never had a kind word spoken to me till I came to work in your factory. Mr. Wilson, you treated me well; you encouraged me to do well, and to learn to read and write, and to try to make something of myself; and God knows how grateful I am for it. Then, sir, I found my wife; you’ve seen her,–you know how beautiful she is. When I found she loved me, when I married her, I scarcely could believe I was alive, I was so happy; and, sir, she is as good as she is beautiful. But now what? Why, it now comes my master, takes me right away from my work, and my friends, and all I like, and grinds me down into the very dirt! Why? Because, he says, I forgot who I was; he says, to teach me that I am only a nigger! After all, and last of all, he comes between me and my wife, and says I shall give her up, and live with another woman. And all this laws give him power to do, in spite of God or man. Mr. Wilson, look at it! There isn’t one of all these things, that have broken the hearts of my mother and my sister, and my wife and me, but your laws allow, and give every man power to do inKentucky, and none can say to him, nay! Do you call these the laws of my country? Sir, I haven’t any country, any more than I have any father. But I’m going to have one. I don’t want anything of your country, except to be let alone,–to go peaceably out of it; and when I get toCanada, where the laws will own me and protect me, that shall be my country, and its laws I will obey. But if any man tries to stop me, let him take care, for I am desperate. I’ll fight for my liberty to the last breath I breathe. You say your fathers did it; if it was right for them, it is right for me!”

 

Powerful! The realization that the slaves are in a country which just recently declared itself “free from oppression” makes the system utterly absurd and contradictory.

 

With the voice of Augustine, Stowe tells us what slavery is really:

 

This cursed business, accursed of God and man, what is it? Strip it of all its ornament, run it down to the root and nucleus of the whole, and what is it? Why, because my brother Quashy is ignorant and weak, and I am intelligent and strong,–because I know how, and can do it,–therefore, I may steal all he has, keep it, and give him only such and so much as suits my fancy. Whatever is too hard, to dirty, to disagreeable, for me, I may set Quashy to doing. Because I don’t like work, Quashy shall work. Because the sun burns me, Quashy shall stay in the sun. Quashy shall earn the money, and I will spend it. Quashy shall lie down in every puddle, that I may walk over dry-shod. Quashy shall do my will and not his, all the days of his mortal life, and have such chance of getting to heaven, at last as I find convenient. This I take to be about what slavery is. I defy anybody on earth to read our slave-cod, as it stands in our lawny-books, and make anything else of it. Talk of the abuses of slavery! Humbug! The thing itself is the essence of all abuse!

 

In painting theUnited Statesas the land of freedom or God’s country, you cannot forget about slavery. What was it doing in the land of freedom? What was it doing in a country that prided itself in its application to the teachings of the Bible? Slavery’s social and political ramifications reach us even today. It is inAmerica’s history and its roots. Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin is a must read for Americans so that we do not forget.