The Depiction of Violence in Uncle Tom’s Cabin versus Kindred
Initially, one may suggest that it is the time in which these respective novels were written that effects the description of violence. For example, Kindred, being a more recent novel than UTC perhaps appeals to an audience more capable of stomaching such imagery. After all, the narrator of UTC goes so far as to address the reader when discussing the beatings and claims that the heart of the reader is much too sensitive to be privy to the horrors these slaves experienced (376)¹.
However, this notion of the time of publication being responsible for overt depictions of violence or lack thereof comes into question when one considers the explicit description of the violence endured by slaves in the narrative of Frederick Douglass, published in 1845, seven years before the publication of UTC.
And so the question evolves -- maybe it is the backgrounds of these authors that affect the depiction of violence. Harriet Stowe was a white abolitionist, whilst Fredrick Douglass and Octavia Butler were African Americans and were/are part of the slave narrative, whether directly or indirectly. Perhaps it is due to the intimacy with which Douglass and Butler may regard this topic of violence against slaves that inspires them to express it in such a vivid manner. They are telling the story of their own people, whereas Stowe is telling the slaves story as a white outsider.
Furthermore, the audience Butler may be trying to appeal to is one of African Americans specifically, and her descriptions of violence act as a tool to adequately educate young minds on the horrible and ugly truths of what their ancestors endured at the hands of white men. In fact, this claim can be supported when one finds out that the motivation behind Butler’s penning of Kindred was triggered when she “was troubled by a fellow classmate’s naive criticism of previous generations for their ‘subservience’ during slavery” (Mehri)². Douglass however, can be said to be addressing the white masses and the literate African Americans of the time, both to expose the cruelty of the whites, and act as a beacon of hope for those who were still enslaved.
References
- Stowe, Harriet B. Uncle Tom's Cabin . 2nd ed., W. W. Norton & Company, 2010.
- @RuffneckRefugee. “Octavia Butler was troubled by a fellow classmate’s naive criticism of previous generations for their ‘subservience’ during slavery. So she wrote Kindred.” Twitter, 3 May. 2018, 4:13 a.m., https://twitter.com/RuffneckRefugee/status/991833203735433217
