Horrors of Slavery and It's Lasting Effect

Revered abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass once stated, “I didn’t know I was a slave until I found out I couldn’t do the things I wanted to do.” The repression and subjugation faced by slaves during pre-emancipation America inspired one brave author to address the cruel reality of slavery, deriving it from a childhood dream encompassing a legitimate underground railroad. In Colson Whitehead’s fictional novel, The Underground Railroad, he utilizes a myriad of documented facts and appeals to the audience to convey historical relevance in relation to contemporary American society and depict the horrors of slavery and its lasting effect on history.

Whitehead uses multiple rhetorical devices such as pathos and ethos, to appeal to his audience. In his youth, Whitehead had envisioned a, “subway beneath the earth that escaped slaves could ride to freedom,” and from this came he derived the notion to create a fictional but real story about the harsh reality of slavery (Fresh Air, Terry Gross).

By transforming what was formerly a network of secret routes and safehouses into a secret railroad system beneath the very land where slavery existed, Whitehead appeals to his audience, allowing them to visualize a literal underground railroad where slaves could ride to freedom. The creation of a real railroad blazes a path for the main character, Cora, as she escapes from slavery. Every stop on the railroad granted Cora the opportunity to experience a new state, “with its own customs and way of doing things. Moving through them, you’ll see the breadth of the country before you reach your final stop” (Whitehead, 70).

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Through the usage of such rhetorical devices, Whitehead’s readers are able to envision the concept of a runaway slave’s journey towards freedom in the north.

Throughout the novel, there are notable occurrences where historical accuracies emphasize the brutality of slavery in America and its aftermath in future eras. One section that reflects the reality of slavery is ‘Georgia’. The majority of plantation life for a slave is described in this section up until Cora’s escape. One particular moment that highlights the violence of slavery is when “ Chester bumped him. Chester simpered and bowed down before the white man. ‘Sorry, Master! Sorry, master!’ The cane crashed across his shoulder and head, again and again. The boy screamed and shrank to the dirt as the blows continued. Terrance’s arm rose and fell” (Whitehead, 34). The immediate aggression carried out by Terrance had always been the instinctual nature of slave owners. Every little mishap meant enduring another beating such violence and brutality is vital to understanding the essence of slavery. In the section ‘Tennessee,’ Ridgeway, a ruthless slave catcher, returns Cora to her plantation when they come across a burnt field.

When assessing the scorched field and reminiscing the forest that once was, Ridgeway attempts to lighten the mood saying, “Next time you need to make a road, make sure you have ten thousand starving Cherokee on hand to clear it for you” alluding to the Trail of Tears and Death, where Native Americans were forced from their homelands to government reservations (Whitehead, 208). The effect of reducing such an impactful and devastating event in American history to a humorous joke directly engages the audience’s logos as to how horrific times were during the height of racial oppression. Whitehead’s inclusion of yet another horrific point in history where Americans mistreated another race adds meaning to the effect slavery had in the future when similar situations occurred. The fact that this type of conduct was a repeated pattern in history shows towards the savagery of human nature and how it lasted beyond the time of slavery.

Despite the fact that the author took a historic event and transformed it into a fictional narrative, he did not stray from any historical truths. Because Whitehead’s fictional narrative stemmed from his own creative conceptual design there is limited credibility on his part in terms of logos. However, he builds a reliable character in an effort to strengthen his ethos, by explaining how he researched multiple slave narratives to accurately describe the lives of a slave. In an interview on Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Whitehead commented on how he “researched slave narratives instead of the slave catcher’s point of view because he felt the slave catcher’s point of view was the default setting in American history.” Some slave narratives he researched included the likes of “Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, and even some collected by the U.S government by the WPA”. This research of slave narratives establishes Whitehead’s novel to reflect real life experiences of slaves alongside his fictional twist of a real railroad. These resources also provided Whitehead a “great resource just to get slang and an idea of, as a writer, the variety of a plantation experience” (Fresh Air). By immersing himself in the language spoken by slaves, Whitehead was able to form a clearer picture of what slave life was like and therefore strengthens his credibility as an author of a fictional slave novel.

Colson Whitehead scatters several references to historical events in his novel to develop the integrity of his story in portraying the horrors of slavery. During Cora and Caesar’s stay in South Carolina, a state where blacks were able to coexist with whites, they found themselves taking part in a unique research experiment. As newcomers to the state, they were both required to take blood tests so that the doctors could check their health. However, what they did not realize was that they were “participants in a study of the latent and tertiary stages of syphilis”, a test solely restricted to colored men (Whitehead, 124). The inclusion of another instance of inhumane and deteriorating treatment of colored people by Whitehead reminds us that while slavery was a horrific time period, it was not the only occurrence where Americans mistreated black people. The mistreatment of black people has been a repeating pattern in society and while slavery was abolished, the prejudice against blacks failed to waver. Another point in history that Whitehead associates his novel was the hiding in the attic by Harriet Jacobs, a famous former slave that was a lead figure in the abolitionist movement. The main character, Cora, shares a similar hiding spot to Harriet Jacobs when she arrives in North Carolina.

Cora was taken in by an elderly couple who had a hiding spot in their attic as the father of the husband was an agent in the Underground Railroad. Even though Cora was technically free from enslavement she was trapped in a nook above the attic that measured “three feet from the floor and ran fifteen feet in length” (Whitehead, 156). The irony of being free from slavery yet enclosed in a three by fifteen foot area hiding from slave catchers was a similarity that Jacobs and Cora shared. While living in darkness continuously for days on end would not be ideal to any human, for Jacobs, she “would have chosen this, rather than the lot as a slave” even though she “was never cruelly overworked … never lacerated with the whip from head to foot; never so beaten and bruised that she could not turn from one side to the other” (Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl). By referring the historical account of Harriet Jacobs’ escape and connecting two different time periods into the novel, Whitehead further builds the credibility of his fictional story.

In addition to the historical references that Whitehead provides in his novel, he also connects his novel to relevant issues in contemporary society. The most prominent problem that Whitehead’s narrative speaks to is the movement, Black Lives Matter, through the connection of slave patrollers to police brutality. The Black Lives Matter movement “is an ideological and political intervention in a world where Black lives are systematically and intentionally targeted for demise. It is an affirmation of Black folks’ humanity, our contributions to this society, and our resilience in the face of deadly oppression” (blacklivesmatter.com). The main protagonist, Ridgeway, in the novel is a ruthless slave patroller who stops at nothing to return Cora back to her plantation. Slave patrollers “stopped any niggers they saw and demanded their passes. They stopped niggers they knew to be free, for their amusement but also to remind the Africans of the forces arrayed against them, whether they were owned by a white man or not. … They flogged the wayward niggers before bringing them to the jail, or directly to their owner if they were in the mood” (Whitehead, 77). An obvious similarity can be seen between the behavior of slave patrollers in Whitehead’s novel and the police brutality that has flooded the national news in recent years. The stop and frisk habit of police officers today was what used to be law and order during the days of slavery. Whitehead’s intentional connection between slave patroller and police brutality shows his awareness of problems in society today and how they originated from the culture developed from slavery. Another issue in society that Whitehead addresses is gender inequality.

Whitehead purposefully chooses his main character as an African American female to empower a group that has experienced extensive biases and discrimination. As Whitehead explains in his interview with Reid Armbruster of the Audible, It is a very different state of horror being a woman under slavery than a man. Once you hit puberty, you’re supposed to make more slaves and you have no agency over who you marry or what’s going to happen to your children” (Armbruster, Audible Inc.). This intentional choice by Whitehead to make his lead role a female shows that he is aware of a bigger issue that still exists in society today. Whitehead’s decision to have a female protagonist not only connects to the struggle for gender equality in modern society, but it also shows the lesser known harassment that black women suffered. Women in slavery not only received physical abusement like the men, but they were also subject to sexual abuse from their masters and other slaves. Cora was not spared either and sexual abuse became a factor in her decision to run. After Cora received her punishment for decisively jumping in to protect Chester after his bump, she became the new target of Terrance, the plantation owner, “when Terrance got to Cora, he slipped his hand into her shift and cupped her breast. He squeezed. She did not move” (Whitehead, 48). Whitehead’s creation of Cora’s character describes the unfortunate circumstances all enslaved women found themselves in.

With the effective use of rhetorical devices the author recreates the terrors of slavery through his novel, The Underground Railroad. Whitehead engages with the audience’s emotions to successfully communicate his thoughts and opinions on the cruelty of slavery. Throughout the novel, Whitehead connected his story back to historical events to verify his fictional creation and also addressed influential social issues in modern society. Through his novel and main character, Cora, Whitehead cleverly presented his stance on an everlasting and devastating issue, while at the same time creating a childhood inspired fictional story.