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12 Years a Slave Essay

In: Historical Events

Submitted By gotitrex
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12 Years a Slave
Author: Solomon Northup
Forwarded By: Steve McQueen
History 1301
October 7, 2013

The main idea of the book was to share with the reader and give a deeper understanding of what occurrences happened during the darkest periods in American history. The author shares his life during his twelve years, on a personal level, to be able to connect with his readers and show his perspective on his experiences during his time held captive as a slave. When taught about slavery, students can grasp, understand and feel how slaves felt back during the 1800s. Slaves were brutally beaten and worked from dusk till dawn. Slave masters had no mercy on their slaves; they would beat them till they were close to death. This is in fact true, what students are taught gives only one perspective of how slaves were treated. Because of this perspective that was planted in their minds, students begin to feel sorry and grateful that they were not born during that era. But one cannot just base their thoughts on just one thing; the whole picture must be seen in order to understand. Born and raised as a free man, Solomon Northup was framed, robbed of his free papers, and was sold into slavery. When Northup was taken into slavery, his first master, William Ford, was a kind master. He spoke only good things and encouraged his slaves to do better. Ford was rare; there were not many masters like him. Ford was kind to his slaves; he never beat them with a whip or humiliated them in front of their peers. This is changes the readers’ views of what slavery were like during this time. There may have been many slave masters who were brutal to their slaves, but slave masters like Ford changes that perspective then the reader begins to see that not all slave masters that they thought of were cruel. Northup’s second master, John M. Tibeats, was the stereotypical master who

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