Compare And Contrast Harriet Jacobs And Frederick Douglass

Informal Essay 3 Harriet Jacob’s and Frederick Douglass both became salves in their younger years. Through their narratives we are able to get a better understanding of how they were treated and what they experienced as slaves. However, their experiences and their style of writing about their life as a slave, greatly differs. They both present us with a “literary scene”. Harriet Jacobs narrative stressed the importance of family, home and love. Her narrative was more sentimental than Douglass’s. As a slave she did not really suffer the hardships that most slaves would. Even though her “kind mistress sickened and died” (821), she was fortunate enough to be sent to spend a week with her grandmother. Harriet showed some hope thinking that she would be set free because of how respected and faithful her mother was instead she was bequeathed to a different mistress. Even thought Jacobs was born into slavery and sold to a different slave owner she still managed to look at this unfortunate situation in a fortunate way “ I try to think with less bitterness of this act of injustice” (822). As we see through Jacobs narrative that even though she was born into slavery she had very strong family ties. Her grandmother had a big influence on her and the decisions she made. Her grandmother’s main goal was to keep the family and her children safe even if that …show more content…
The overall sense of emotion felt very distant throughout Douglass’s narrative. He seems to be very cold about the things he has experienced; “I have often been utterly astonished…to find persons who could speak of singing, among slaves, as evidence of their contentment and happiness. It is impossible to conceive of a greater mistake. Slave sing most when they are most unhappy” (952). Douglass makes the reader realize that as a man he prefers to focus on the more intellectual topics in his narrative. He craved knowledge and