The Passing of Grandison

“The Passing of Grandison,” is an interesting story which involves a man named Dick who tries to impress a girl to marry him through taking his slave Grandison up north to set him free. This supposed act of kindness is solely an act of selfishness because Dick is using Grandison’s freedom to better his own personal life. These types of actions and mistreatment of blacks and slaves was pretty common in this time period, and I think that Chesnutt uses this story as an key example to demonstrate how wrong these actions are, and to make people feel guilty for drawing similarities to people like Dick.

Also Chesnutt uses a specific dialect in this story that is very specific and the impression it gives his audience is very strong. The constant use of words like the “n-word” and very rough, off-color speech, adds to the wrongful prejudice and mistreatment occurring in, “The Passing of Grandison,” that Chesnutt is trying to relay to his audience in this story. There is an apparent change towards the end of the story where Dick reveals an act of remorse for Grandison when Grandison shows up at his wedding and identifies that he had been kidnapped by abolitionists and beaten severely. This remorse is new to the audience and I think Chesnutt purposely presented it to us to further main goal of ending these prejudices and mistreatments of minorities.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Huck demonstrates a different attitude from Tom Sawyer. He seems to originate original thoughts unlike Tom who just acts solely on his mischievous behavior. For instance, in the beginning of the book when Tom and Huck are out in the woods beside their house and Jim hears something suspicious so he goes to investigate. Jim eventually falls asleep and just when Tom and Huck are about to make a clean get away, Tom wants to take things further and tie Jim’s feet together, throw his hat on a tree, and plainly mess with him. Huck seems to express deep concern for these type of actions that Tom generally takes, but every time it seems as he conforms himself to believe the same things that Tom does and partake in the same type of activities.

Perhaps the main reason Huck confides so much in the rebellious life in which he leads along with Tom, is that he truly is happy when there is nothing holding him back, or trying to force him to do something. His father beat him for expressing virtually any kind of emotion or success. Aunt Polly, Miss Watson and others desperately try to turn Huck into a different young man than he is, therefore this rebellious attitude comes about. Although he doesn’t necessarily like all the things in which he and Tom do together, he concludes that it is much better than having to conform to all these other society-type people who force him to become something he hates, as evidenced from the quote, “I asked if she reckoned Tom Sawyer would go there [hell], and, she said, not by a considerable sight. I was glad about that, because I wanted him and me to be together.”

"Revolution is the Pod," and "The name -- of it -- is 'Autumn'"

These two poems relate to the Civil War although from two differing views because of the times they were written. “The name – of it –is Autumn,” was written before the war in 1862 and, “Revolution is the Pod,” after the war in 1866.

In the poem, “The name – of it –is Autumn,” the seasonal suggestions refer to Civil War themes that lead up to the Civil War. “When Winds- upset the Basin, And spill the Scarlet Rain,” depicts “the Basin” as being the upset southerners or confederates who were angry at the northerners or the “Scarlet Rain”, and the “spilling” to which it refers could very well be the Civil War beginning to unravel and all of these disagreements resulting in fighting breaking out. However the author at this time, 1862, could not have known for certain that a great Civil War amongst our own nation and on our own lands could have ever occurred. That is why the author does a great job of putting the audience in that time period, and what things were like up until the war. In Dickinson’s, “Revolution is the Pod,” similar relations to the Civil War are noticed in the lines, “Left inactive on the Stalk, All it’s Purple fled, Revolution shakes it for, Test if it be dead.” She refers to the post-war actions as being “inactive” and “purple fled” meaning no more bloodshed. She mentions the, “Revolution shakes it for,” in attempts to, “Test if it be dead,” meaning all the fighting which no has come to pass, was necessary to purify this nation of any wrong directions that our country could have been heading. Perhaps the reason why, “The name – of it –is Autumn,” wasn’t published until after the war, was because the author felt that the country was already in a horrible state and didn’t want to add to the chaos which was currently circulating, and in no way wanted to be any bit responsible for contributing to all the fighting and death involved in war.


Also another key thing to notice is the color schemes that the authors refer to in both poems. The “Purple” or blood, “the Scarlet Rain,” the Reddish brown leaves of Autumn as, “Russet Base,” all are mentioned in these poems in relation to the Civil War and the season at which both poems take place. Other than just describing the setting of these two poems, perhaps the authors felt that the Autumn-like season was an excellent way of conveying their feelings of the Civil War with many vibrant colors and seasonal imagery available such as the above listed, to help disguise their true intent of each poem.

Civil War historian Mark Neely makes a claim that basically questions how much Whitman valued the African American race at this time, and suggests that he could quite possibly be a racist for not mentioning the Emancipation Proclamation his poem Beat! Beat! Drums. Neely mentions that Whitman was even in Washington at the time that Abraham Lincoln signed the proclamation on January 1, 1863. Therefore Neely proposes, how could Walt Whitman left out such a significant event in history that he was present for, in his poem, unless he was in fact a racist or a “mystical nationalist” as quoted by Neely. The major reason that I believe such enthusiasm toward the Emancipation Proclamation in the Beat! Beat! Drums poem is that Whitman was not necessarily a racist or a mystical nationalist, but rather he just didn’t think much of African Americans therefore failed to mention them. At this point in history, African Americans had just been freed from slavery and were considered the lowest race in the society at the time because the only thing they had been used for was as personal slaves and manual labor efforts. Now take that work necessity away and they can’t read, write, speak well… There are a number of things that the African American people at this time could not do, one of which is vote. This is a major reason that I believe Whitman didn’t mention African Americans in his poem, because he and everyone else in society, didn’t think anything of them to even consider including them in a poem about the struggles the majority of society is having with war efforts coming to every town, and disrupting everyone’s daily lives. Hence the mentioning of issues such as church services, school classrooms, weddings, people sleeping, people singing… all being disrupted in the poem.

Walt Whitman’s poem Beat! Beat! Drums, however mostly supports Neely’s claim that Whitman is a mystical nationalist with racist tendencies. I was just trying to reach as deep as possible to bring up possible reasons that defend his lack of mentioning the Emancipation Proclamation in his poem. Although yes, Neely’s claim does seem to be accurate with all the supported evidence he supply in this quote and could significantly make his audiences follow him in his negative beliefs about Whitman, the man who opened the field of American poets and of modern poetry as we know it in the world today. In Horton’s and Timrod’s poems they differ from Whitman’s poem in that they both mention the Emancipation Proclamation or rather the importance of African Americans and their rights. For instance in Henry Timrod’s poem The Cotton Boll, he says, “Of this broad earth, and throngs the sea with ships, That bear no thunders; hushes hungry lips In alien lands.” This quote seems to hint at the presence of slave ships from somewhere like Africa in the narrators’ analysis of the world as he sees it. At this point of the poem, it just so happens that the next very few lines start to transition into strong opposition to the Civil War uprisings. It is only common to relate this to the fact that Timrod is against slavery, war, and killing for the reasons of establishing the Union among the southern rebels.

Whitman does seem to solely support the Union cause as exemplified in his quote, “Beat! beat! drums! blow! bugles! blow! Make no parley – stop for no expostulation, Mind not the timid—not the weeper or prayer.” This quote seems to complain about the Union soldiers or just the war activist common to people’s town, disrupting their common way of life with the beat of drums and blowing of bugles as these lines mention. However when Whitman says, “make no parley—stop for no expostulation,” he suggests a stop for nothing mentality for the Union soldiers, and that flooding these towns with their war-driven minds and men longing to kill, is the only way to get what they want, which is to impose the Union cause upon the whole nation. Also when Whitman mentions, “Mind not the timid – mind not the weeper or prayer,” he is again suggesting more of this erratic war-driven mentality that these Union soldiers should stop at nothing and nobody to effectively force their beliefs upon the whole nation. Towards the end of the poem, at first what seemed like utter shock and madness towards the Union soldiers coming to towns and disrupting people’s lives, has now become a strong support for the Union soldiers to keep marching and pounding their beliefs into everyone’s skulls. As demonstrated through the quote, “So strong you thump O terrible drums—so loud you bugles blow.”