Comparing 12 Years A Slave And Narrative Of The Life Of Frederick Douglass

Slavery is something that everyone in our country all familiar with. A crucial event in the history of American that helped shape it into what it is today. It is recognized, but do people fully grasp the life of a slave? Do people truly understand the exhausting brutal life that is unlike anything else in our history. The thing that is most unreal about slavery is that it was legal. Not just that, but it was widely accepted and few people would think morally and see the horror within the life of a typical slave. After watching “12 Years a Slave” and reading “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass”,you can clearly see the intense and cruel treatment they received, and how it shaped both of them as people once they escaped/ were freed.

Solomon identity is wiped away as they force him to go by a new name, and lose all ties from his previous life as a free man. However, he never forgets his true identity which gives him the strength to push through and reminds him of the hope of survival. He had a family, and a successful career as a violinist, and each time he thought of this, he would lose all sight of the awful things he witnessed and remember his past life. This could be related to Frederick Douglass when he finally is sent to his last master and can start to think about an escape. Similar to the way that Solomon thought of his family when he needed strength for survival, Frederick thinks of a woman that he met during his stay in Baltimore, whom he will eventually reconnect with and marry. Both men lose their identity, but eventually regain it as they work immensely hard in order to reach their goal of escape. This changed my viewpoint on slavery because both stories portrayed it in a way that shows a slave's point of view and the thoughts going through their mind when they think of the hope of