Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

Amanda Onalaja

October 11, 2009

Pd. 2 – Ms. Brown

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl was written by Harriet Ann Jacobs, but under the pen name Linda Brent. The pen name probably helped Jacobs to narrate the story without feeling guilty for the tales told within. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is an appeal to pathos and ethos, in which the story expresses deep emotional ties and references to God as an escape from Linda’s woes. In the opening sentence, Linda make an important remark, “I was born a slave; but I never knew it till six years of happy childhood had passed away”, this is a critical beginning because readers learn she had a shielded childhood. Why would her parent’s refuse to instill the workings of slavery in her, why wouldn’t they prepare her for the fate she was meant to endure? I believe not knowing, or not believing she was a slave helped her to manifest strength and self worth, to know she wasn’t a piece of property. That strength was necessary to survive. Readers become somewhat attached to Linda, our young protagonist that had to grow up too fast, “Such were the unusually fortunate circumstances of my early childhood. When I was six years old, my mother died; and then, for the first time, I learned, by the talk around me, that I was a slave”.

God is referred to in the narrative, and I’m sure those who read it in Jacob’s time connected with it, “These God-breathing machines are no more, in the sight of their masters, than the cotton they plant, or the horses they tend”. Jacob’s doesn’t call them “human beings” or “men”, she refers to the slaves as “God-breathing machines”, equal in God’s eyes but lesser in the eyes of their masters. In her preface Jacobs wrote that she was a bit hesitant to put her autobiography out there, but hoped reading it would make a difference. Beside those who may have been too ignorant to recognize her heart, I believe her strong words fell on deaf ears, but with countless examples of the suffering of a harmless race, how could one just ignore it?

The diction in the narrative is also very strong. In one paragraph Linda make reference to a woman who had to relinquish her children to slavery, “She may be an ignorant creature, degraded by the system that has brutalized her from childhood; but she has a mother's instincts, and is capable of feeling a mother's agonies”, the term “mother’s agonies” is a phrase all can understand, for we all can reciprocate to a mother’s love. Brent coins hard hitting phrases like this throughout the piece I’ve read, “Her sufferings, afterwards, became so intense, that her mistress felt unable to stay; but when she left the room, the scornful smile was still on her lips”, imaging the pain of slaves back then, that would watch their children die and be grateful knowing they wouldn’t have to suffer through slavery, says a lot about slavery. In fact, it says a thousand words. Even though Jacobs used add-ins like this that may have had nothing to do with her personally, I’m sure it gave the audience she directed it toward back then something to think about. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl carried a defiant tone, even though I believe Jacob’s didn’t want sympathy for the obstacles she faced. She just wanted a chance to express them.