Words Beneath Our Feet
When walking amongst an old abandoned building taken over by nature, on a land you are unfamiliar with, do you ever wonder what had happened there? If there were secrets held, deaths or tortured souls that once walked on the very ground you are standing on? This is how I feel about the lands of the South. I believe that trees hundreds of years old and the dirt beneath our feet hold the stories. They can hold the residual emotions that once swept the places at hand and always will. Back when the horrid acts of slavery were a reality, I cannot even bare to think of the horrible acts that took place to innocent people. People that were ripped apart from their families and homes to be thrown in a ship with unbearable conditions just to be controlled and owned on lands they were unfamiliar with. What kind of untold stories do the Southern lands know? What sad residual energies do the trees hold? The Southern lands is where the abomination of human slavery was born; this is where nature holds all the stories from the abomination of slavery. …show more content…
Not only is it where it began, but out of the remainder of the “New World” the South was the cruelest. Frederick Douglass wrote the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself (1845) giving a detailed description of the institution of slavery and to let people know to not be mistaken or forget the immense cruelty that went on. He published this less than seven years after he escaped slavery with brutal details, details that seem almost too horrific to be a reality though many people quoted that nothing was exaggerated.This narrative gives anyone who wants to learn, a glimpse of what it was like to live as a slave. Frederick Douglass is one of the most celebrated writers in the African American literary tradition, and his first autobiography is the one of the most widely read North American slave narratives. It is amazing to me how during such a horrific time for African Americans, there was still glimpses of positivity. “Slavery and brutality could shackle a body, but not a spirit.” is a beautifully put sentence for what I am trying to explain that I read on page one of “The South” in our blackboard unit. Spirituality, support for and from the community, family, and respecting mother nature were also things that were constantly on the mind of those being mistreated. As a literary landscape, the South carried many emotions over-all. People were taken from their freedom and lives by other human beings who wouldn’t see the human race as equal. As stated before, not only is it where it began, but out of the remainder of the “New World” the South was the cruelest. In the South, sadness, tragedy, strong spirituality, hope and support were all very well in the open, and more making an endless literally landscape for the brilliant minds of literature. One of these artists that chose to portray both sadness and happiness was the exceptional poet, Jean Toomer. One of the unhappy poems is “A Portrait in Georgia” reading “Hair-braided chestnut, coiled like a lyncher's rope, Eyes-fagots, Lips-old scars, or the first red blisters, Breath-the last sweet scent of cane, And her slim body, white as the ash of black flesh after flame.” As for the more uplifting poems, Evening Song would take the part reading “Full moon rising on the waters of my heart, Lakes and moon and fires, Cloine tires, Holding her lips apart. Promises of slumber leaving shore to charm the moon, Miracle made vesper-keeps, Cloine sleeps, And I'll be sleeping soon. Cloine, curled like the sleepy waters whtere the moonwaves start, Radiant, resplendently she …show more content…
A great example of this would be Alice Walker’s writings. Seeing the Pro’s rather than the Con’s, Alice Walker wrote The Color Purple. This novel focuses on the life of an African American woman in the South of the United States speaking of the hardships of African Americans people trying to live in American social culture. This novel was exceptional and recognized for its brilliance. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1983 as well as the National Book Award for Fiction. Later, it was in made into a musical and
When walking amongst an old abandoned building taken over by nature, on a land you are unfamiliar with, do you ever wonder what had happened there? If there were secrets held, deaths or tortured souls that once walked on the very ground you are standing on? This is how I feel about the lands of the South. I believe that trees hundreds of years old and the dirt beneath our feet hold the stories. They can hold the residual emotions that once swept the places at hand and always will. Back when the horrid acts of slavery were a reality, I cannot even bare to think of the horrible acts that took place to innocent people. People that were ripped apart from their families and homes to be thrown in a ship with unbearable conditions just to be controlled and owned on lands they were unfamiliar with. What kind of untold stories do the Southern lands know? What sad residual energies do the trees hold? The Southern lands is where the abomination of human slavery was born; this is where nature holds all the stories from the abomination of slavery. …show more content…
Not only is it where it began, but out of the remainder of the “New World” the South was the cruelest. Frederick Douglass wrote the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself (1845) giving a detailed description of the institution of slavery and to let people know to not be mistaken or forget the immense cruelty that went on. He published this less than seven years after he escaped slavery with brutal details, details that seem almost too horrific to be a reality though many people quoted that nothing was exaggerated.This narrative gives anyone who wants to learn, a glimpse of what it was like to live as a slave. Frederick Douglass is one of the most celebrated writers in the African American literary tradition, and his first autobiography is the one of the most widely read North American slave narratives. It is amazing to me how during such a horrific time for African Americans, there was still glimpses of positivity. “Slavery and brutality could shackle a body, but not a spirit.” is a beautifully put sentence for what I am trying to explain that I read on page one of “The South” in our blackboard unit. Spirituality, support for and from the community, family, and respecting mother nature were also things that were constantly on the mind of those being mistreated. As a literary landscape, the South carried many emotions over-all. People were taken from their freedom and lives by other human beings who wouldn’t see the human race as equal. As stated before, not only is it where it began, but out of the remainder of the “New World” the South was the cruelest. In the South, sadness, tragedy, strong spirituality, hope and support were all very well in the open, and more making an endless literally landscape for the brilliant minds of literature. One of these artists that chose to portray both sadness and happiness was the exceptional poet, Jean Toomer. One of the unhappy poems is “A Portrait in Georgia” reading “Hair-braided chestnut, coiled like a lyncher's rope, Eyes-fagots, Lips-old scars, or the first red blisters, Breath-the last sweet scent of cane, And her slim body, white as the ash of black flesh after flame.” As for the more uplifting poems, Evening Song would take the part reading “Full moon rising on the waters of my heart, Lakes and moon and fires, Cloine tires, Holding her lips apart. Promises of slumber leaving shore to charm the moon, Miracle made vesper-keeps, Cloine sleeps, And I'll be sleeping soon. Cloine, curled like the sleepy waters whtere the moonwaves start, Radiant, resplendently she …show more content…
A great example of this would be Alice Walker’s writings. Seeing the Pro’s rather than the Con’s, Alice Walker wrote The Color Purple. This novel focuses on the life of an African American woman in the South of the United States speaking of the hardships of African Americans people trying to live in American social culture. This novel was exceptional and recognized for its brilliance. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1983 as well as the National Book Award for Fiction. Later, it was in made into a musical and