Uncle Tom’s Cabin is a powerful, historical book, which touches upon many of the issues of its time. The author, Harriet Beecher Stowe, addresses issues such as slavery, feminism, religion, and prohibition through her own commentary and symbology of characters and situations. Pushing for many different reforms, the first and foremost being the abolition of slaves.
Stowe presented to the public of her time, an argument not uncommon in that period, that slavery should be abolished. She used her book to counter some of the most common argument in favor of slavery. She showed the evils in every form of slavery starting with the most mild of forms and ending with the most cruel, heart-wrenching form and broke down the viewpoint that slaves were just belongings instead of human beings, who suffer just as much,if not more, as a white man. She did so in the use of characters such as Mr. Shelby and St. Clare, George (the slave), Mr. Haley, Legree, and Eva.
One of the common pro-slavery arguments was that not all …show more content…
Her biggest card in doing this is through Legree, whose drunken and brutish ways are made to point out the evil and violent ways of a drunkard. She also uses Uncle Tom to show that it 's not moral to drink by comparing his morality to Legree and showing that drinking is unchristian. Throughout the entire book, Uncle Tom asks and pleads with people not to drink whenever he sees it and is given a chance to, saying things like “I wish i could persuade you to leave off drinking. Don’t you know it’ll be the ruin of ye, body and soul?”(184) showing how Stowe felt about alcohol and the immorality of it.
In short, Uncle Tom’s Cabin was a historically significant book. Harriet Beecher Stowe masterfully uses symbolism and and dialogue to speak upon issues such as slavery, feminism, religion, and prohibition. Stowe meant to cause a change in the hearts of the people and used this book as her
Stowe presented to the public of her time, an argument not uncommon in that period, that slavery should be abolished. She used her book to counter some of the most common argument in favor of slavery. She showed the evils in every form of slavery starting with the most mild of forms and ending with the most cruel, heart-wrenching form and broke down the viewpoint that slaves were just belongings instead of human beings, who suffer just as much,if not more, as a white man. She did so in the use of characters such as Mr. Shelby and St. Clare, George (the slave), Mr. Haley, Legree, and Eva.
One of the common pro-slavery arguments was that not all …show more content…
Her biggest card in doing this is through Legree, whose drunken and brutish ways are made to point out the evil and violent ways of a drunkard. She also uses Uncle Tom to show that it 's not moral to drink by comparing his morality to Legree and showing that drinking is unchristian. Throughout the entire book, Uncle Tom asks and pleads with people not to drink whenever he sees it and is given a chance to, saying things like “I wish i could persuade you to leave off drinking. Don’t you know it’ll be the ruin of ye, body and soul?”(184) showing how Stowe felt about alcohol and the immorality of it.
In short, Uncle Tom’s Cabin was a historically significant book. Harriet Beecher Stowe masterfully uses symbolism and and dialogue to speak upon issues such as slavery, feminism, religion, and prohibition. Stowe meant to cause a change in the hearts of the people and used this book as her