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Compare And Contrast Learning To Read And Write And The Allegory Of The Cave

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Within the lives of most, there is a point in time where one begins a journey of knowledge. One’s way of thinking changes drastically from the beginning of a journey to the end, due to an exposure to a new way of thinking along the way. Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” and the piece “Learning to Read and Write” by Frederick Douglass are two literary pieces that both reflect on great journey’s embarked on by the protagonists. The “Allegory of the Cave” presents a protagonist who goes on a journey to enlightenment and conceptualizes his experiences. “Learning to Read and Write” is a narrative of Douglass’ experience learning to read and write as a slave and how his perception of his own life differed going forward. Looking at “Learning to Read …show more content…

The liberator plays a key role in the prisoner's journey of attaining knowledge. The liberator serves as a driving force to the prisoner, releasing him from what holds him back, exposing him to a new view of reality and compelling him to move up the steep and rugged ascent. Looking through the lens of Plato’s allegory at “Learning to Read and Write” Douglass’ mistress emerges as an important liberator on his journey. Taking into account the initial job of the liberator, it is shown that the mistress engages him with letters and literature; she functions as his initial exposure to this new reality and her teaching serves as his unchaining process. He writes “The first step had been taken. Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given me the inch, and no precaution could prevent me from taking the ell” (Douglass 101). This event where he reflects on the mistress exposing him to the alphabet echoes Plato’s avowal that in order to begin a journey to enlightenment a liberator must expose the prisoner to a new form of reality and show them there is more to the world than their perceptions. In this example “Learning to Read and Write '' fully conforms with the …show more content…

Once Plato’s liberator has unchained the prisoner, he maintains pushing the prisoner up the steep and rugged ascent until full exposure to reality is achieved. Unlike in the allegory, there is an element of rechaining from Douglass’ liberator that Plato’s allegory does not account for. In talking about the switch of the mistress’ personality from liberating to rechaining Douglass says “The first step in her downward course was in her ceasing to instruct me. She now commenced to practise her husband’s precepts’... I have had her rush at me with a face made all up of fury, and snatch from me a newspaper, in a manner that fully revealed her apprehension” (Douglass 101). The idea of rechaining certainly lacks conformity with Plato’s assertion that the liberator serves as a guide throughout one's journey to enlightenment. The allegory fails to account for the fact that sometimes one’s initial liberator does not maintain a liberating stance throughout the journey. This idea suggests that there are limitations to Plato’s allegorical vision regarding the liberator. In this case, the mistress only provides Douglass with an ounce of information to get him started on his journey before she switches and becomes one of the forces holding him back from enlightenment. This example proves that Plato’s allegory about the path to enlightenment does have some

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Douglass knew that the only way to be treated like a human being -- and eventually become on of the most successful black men of the nineteenth century -- was through learning. Learning can be tough and painful, but it is through the pain that people grow and learn to thrive. Both the man in Plato’s Republic and Frederick Douglass learned to breathe through the pain as they went about their learning experiences. Both works illustrate the idea of enlightenment through learning and how painful the brutal reality of truth is. While one is metaphor and one is autobiographical, they show that if one can learn to get passed the pain, you can free yourself and experience a world you never knew

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First Douglass writes about his relatives who were still being held by his old master. He begs Thomas Auld to tell him how they are doing and set them free. However, this is not enough so he asks his master how he would "look upon me, were I, some dark night, in company with a band of hardened villains, to enter the precincts of your elegant dwelling, and seize the person of your own lovely daughter, Amanda, and carry her … make her … compel her … place her … disregard her … feed her … and so on" (105). This is an important rebuttal which asks not only his master, but oppressors in general to imagine the reverse, where they are the ones being treated like that. It allows them to think about what it would be like were they in the same position as Frederick Douglass and his fellows.

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In Frederick Douglass' autobiography, NLFD, he explains his life experiences during and after slavery. He develops the connection that education has to freedom. He supports this connection with rhetorical devices that contributes to the structure and meaning of his ideas. I've been asked to consider the questions including "What is freedom?", "Why is it important for people and cultures to construct narratives about their experiences?", and "In the face of adversity, what causes some individuals to prevail while others fail?" Your personal answer to each question can determine how one would interpret Douglass' connection between education and freedom.

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In the passage, Frederick Douglass speaks about the particulars of his state of mind as an escaped slave, a fugitive, in 1830’s New York. Throughout the passage, Douglass comprehensively uses similes and metaphors, as well as tone shifts, and repetition, to fully impart unto the reader his not only elation at being free but also his fears, exhaustion and his anxiety towards trusting people. This garners both empathy and understanding from his audience. Douglass opens the passage by describing parts of his escape to New York, comparing his elation to that of a “mariner . . .

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Learning to Read and to write is a sample of Fredrick’s Douglass literature. An African- American who was born in Maryland and was supposed to become a slave for his entire life. In his piece of writing ‘’Learning to Read and Write’’, the author tells the reader how learning the basic rules of reading and writing was a challenge while being a slave. Besides being a young twelve year old boy who does not own his personal life, his doesn’t deserve the right to eradicate the disease of illiteracy from his life for the only reason that many other Africans and Indians suffer from, slavery. The first audience of Douglass’s text is everyone who read ‘’Narrative of the life’’ from which the text was excerpted as well as whoever is in the same situation as being a slave or feeling concerned

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Frederick Douglass’s 1845 excerpt, “Learning to Read and Write” (paragraphs 7+8), shifts from slavery and abolitionism to learning how to write as a slave, utilizes homogenous analogies, parallel structure, and anaphoras, in order to show that although “learning how to write” is a “treacherous” and a “long, tedious effort” for slaves, hard work will eventually lead to success. Homogenous analogies, such as the fruit of abolition and the light breaking upon Douglass, accentuate how the word “abolition” can literally bring a person closer to freedom. For instance, Douglass mentions how a slave who “ran away” or “set fire to a barn” is associated with abolition. It took Douglass sometime to acquire the definition of “abolition” because he had

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Frederick Douglass wrote “Learning to Read and Write” to explain the many dangers of his life as a slave and how he eventually learned to read and write through his mistress and the many people he met in the South. Douglass evolves into an educated man early in his life as his writing is evident to show his maturing either by his language and syntax. Douglass writes his piece about a hurtful topic in a light hearted manner that shows his determination in becoming free, but without reaching the bitter and painful side of his early life as a slave. The usage of anecdotal passages throughout the piece allows it to be read by a wide variety of audiences as Douglass purposely did not choose to include the harsh treatment and abuse as a slave but rather just say that life was hard.

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The second attempt to escape brought him freedom in another place. Douglass found it hard to leave his friends behind. But in favor to have freedom in his life he had to give up the friendship he found in Baltimore. While reading this last chapter it sounded like this was another huge turning point in Douglass’s life, after reading the Liberator he was getting more familiar with the antislavery movement.

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The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave by Frederick Douglass (University of Virginia Library. Web. 15 Dec. 2015) puts readers in a position that allows them to understand the great struggles and misfortunes that came with being an American slave and how Frederick Douglass’ managed to escape from the grasp of slavery and find his own liberating freedom. A daring feat that can be defined by a series of epiphanies, a man’s great determination, and the constant regrowth of a broken man’s soul. From the excerpt, previously shown above, Douglass depicts a vivid image of just how severe the work conditions of slaves were, how difficult it was to please a slave master, and how horribly a man can be ripped of his will.

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It recalled the departed self-confidence, and inspired me again with a determination to be free” (ch. X). This battle with Covey marks a turning point for Douglass because it reignited the hope he once had and reintroduced to him a sense of strength he thought he had lost. In Douglass’s earlier years as a slave, he held a more optimistic outlook on his situation.

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Douglass began to view reading as a curse more than a blessing; a way in which he felt more imprisoned by the slave state he was in. Thus, the more he read the more he began to detest enslavers; which nonetheless in his mind would be nothing but thieves whom robbed slave’s homes. For it was not only reading but his ceaseless mind getting the best of him; such reading would create endless thoughts which haunted him and made him wish that he would remain an ignorant slave. Nonetheless, during Douglass’s thoughts, Douglass began to learn to

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It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy” (262). Eventually, Douglass finds that reading provided him with the small seed of confidence which allowed him to maintain hope that freedom would someday be

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By survey the cover sheet and perusing the words "The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, composed without anyone else" the peruser sees the progression Douglass produced using a needy slave to an autonomous creator (Stone 134). As a slave, he was illegal a voice with which he may stand up against subjugation. Moreover, the customary parts of bondage would have had him uneducated?unable to peruse and unequipped for composing. Notwithstanding, by inspecting the full importance of the cover sheet, the peruser is acquainted with Douglass' refusal to stick to the slave part of uneducated and voiceless. Therefore, even before perusing the work, the peruser realizes that Douglass will appear "how a slave was made a man" through "talking out?the typical demonstration of self-definition" (Stone

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Because of this, he successfully creates a contrast between what the slave owners think of and treat the slaves and how they are. Douglass says that slave’s minds were “starved by their cruel masters”(Douglass, 48) and that “they had been shut up in mental darkness” (Douglass, 48) and through education, something that they were deprived of, Frederick Douglass is able to open their minds and allow them to flourish into the complex people that they are. By showing a willingness to learn to read and write, the slaves prove that they were much more than what was forced upon them by their masters.

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In the autobiography “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” written by himself is a book about an American slave on his extremely challenging journey to freedom. In the book, one of the main themes “Education is the key to freedom” is communicated throughout the course of the book. It is illustrated clearly when Douglass looks on his departure from Colonel Lloyd’s plantation. It is also conveyed when Mr. Auld scolds his wife about educating their slaves. Finally it is communicated when Douglass holds a sabbath school for his fellow slaves.

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