Meditations on the Narrative of Frederick Douglass
“…I could think of nothing, scarcely, but my life; and in thinking of my life, I almost forgot my liberty. I have observed this in my experience of slavery, — that whenever my condition was improved, instead of its increasing my contentment, it only increased my desire to be free, and set me to thinking of plans to gain my freedom. I have found that, to make a contented slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken his moral and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to annihilate the power of reason. He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to feel that slavery is right; and he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be a man.”- Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave. Written by Himself
First and foremost, I would like to acknowledge an inherent discordance within an equation of the historical figure Frederick Douglass as exemplified through the author’s autobiography (Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave. Written by Himself) and the mythical figure Prometheus. The former, a slave of approximately twenty years, ceaselessly fought for the “acquisition” of his freedom from his domineering masters; he desired that which we might all consider the ultimate, and only, “right:” to be his own master. Prometheus, the figure of Greek myth whose aspect and affect has often expressed an influence over both pop culture (including Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein) and academia, stole fire from the Gods, and in so doing constructed a myth that, among other things, acts as an incredible metaphor for the relentlessly human pursuit of knowledge and the unbearable burden of consciousness. It is with this discordance in mind that I draw a particular similarity between these two figures, their differing narratives merging at the pursuit of a common goal and consequence; as Prometheus’ ambitions result in an unbearable existential burden, (as does Adam’s biblical bite), so does Frederick Douglass, at the acquisition of literacy and the gradual, totalizing disabuse of slavery, find himself wholly emancipated from the fetters of his physical existence and, having shaken off his shackles, subjected to a rite of passage for those courageous enough to engineer their own identity: the existential crisis, a destabilizing awareness of the philosophical weight that must be hefted at the acceptance of true self-reliance.
It is interesting, then, the ways in which language itself is represented in the narrative. Though it clearly represents both physical freedom and, perhaps, a tool with which one may attempt to create and express a subjectivity in defiance of the existential burden, Douglass also pits language (words) as an inessential, or ineffective, means of communication. Instead, he shows us through the documentation of slave songs and their emotional resonance that music is perhaps a more important device with which one may relate to others.
“They would then sing most exultingly the following words: —
“I am going away to the Great House Farm!
O, yea! O, yea! O!”
This they would sing, as a chorus, to words which to many would seem unmeaning jargon, but which, nevertheless, were full of meaning to themselves. I have sometimes thought that the mere hearing of those songs would do more to impress some minds with the horrible character of slavery, than the reading of whole volumes of philosophy on the subject could do.”
Douglass is not incorrect- for one far removed from the “horrible character of slavery,” it is quite difficult to attach such powerful meaning to seemingly “unmeaning jargon.” But that meaning so profound can be attached to such simple language is indicative of the unrivaled power of music to bridge those gaps in human connection that words simply cannot access; music possess the potential to evoke within us access to some realm of subjectivity largely untouched by words (interestingly, this discussion of music is predicated upon the ability to communicate with the written word- we know that the music of these slave songs is so powerful because Douglass tells us so).
Frederick Douglass’s narrative, ultimately, is about communication and the flexibility of the definition of language. Through word he describes music, and through both he successfully evokes within us the some understanding of the detestable character of slavery, and, further, the complexity of true self-reliance. Douglass, as an existentialist, as Promethean, is a humanist.
