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Chapter 17. The blood-stained-gate

An archive of emotion and authenticity in the new slave narrative
  • Laura T. Murphy
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A Comparative Literary History of Modern Slavery
This chapter is in the book A Comparative Literary History of Modern Slavery

Abstract

This chapter suggests that the slave narrative employs metonymy as an archive of memory when authors are unwilling or unable to articulate the experience of trauma explicitly. Drawing on Frederick Douglass’s use of the “blood-stained gate” metaphor as a repository for his emotional suffering, it describes how blood serves as a metonymic vehicle for communicating authenticity in narratives in which affective descriptions run counter to the ambitions of the genre. Ismael Beah’s A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier (2007) and Emmanuel Jal’s War Child (2008) present contrasting cases of blood’s capacity to serve as a repository for the emotional content of war. The trope of blood is then is used a lens for understanding why audiences respond skeptically to slave narratives and suggests a less suspicious reading practice among scholars and activists.

Abstract

This chapter suggests that the slave narrative employs metonymy as an archive of memory when authors are unwilling or unable to articulate the experience of trauma explicitly. Drawing on Frederick Douglass’s use of the “blood-stained gate” metaphor as a repository for his emotional suffering, it describes how blood serves as a metonymic vehicle for communicating authenticity in narratives in which affective descriptions run counter to the ambitions of the genre. Ismael Beah’s A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier (2007) and Emmanuel Jal’s War Child (2008) present contrasting cases of blood’s capacity to serve as a repository for the emotional content of war. The trope of blood is then is used a lens for understanding why audiences respond skeptically to slave narratives and suggests a less suspicious reading practice among scholars and activists.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Preface vii
  4. General introduction xi
  5. Slavery, literature and the emotions 1
  6. Part One. Slavery, sentiment and affect
  7. Chapter 1. Slavery, sentimentality and the abolition of affect 18
  8. Chapter 2. Race and affect in Gustave de Beaumont’s Marie, ou L’esclavage aux Etats‑Unis 34
  9. Chapter 3. Touching difference and colonial space 50
  10. Part Two. Slavery between literary codes
  11. Chapter 4. In search of home 78
  12. Chapter 5. Showing and feeling the atrocities of slavery 95
  13. Chapter 6. Politics and faith, slavery and abolition in nineteenth-century Brazilian literature 110
  14. Chapter 7. Melodramatic tableaux vivants 136
  15. Part Three. Pity, identification and interpellation
  16. Chapter 8. Before sentimental empire 158
  17. Chapter 9. “No one can imagine my feelings” 173
  18. Chapter 10. Orientalism, slavery and emotion 191
  19. Chapter 11. Haunting slavery 207
  20. Part Four. Affective ties
  21. Chapter 12. Testamentary manumission and emotional bonds in eighteenth-century Saint-Domingue 226
  22. Chapter 13. Affection amidst domination in a post-slavery society 239
  23. Chapter 14. Bárbora and Jau 254
  24. Part Five. First-person voices
  25. Chapter 15. Scenes of emotion in French early-modern travel writing from the Caribbean 272
  26. Chapter 16. Fear and love in Matanzas 289
  27. Chapter 17. The blood-stained-gate 307
  28. Volume 1. Biographical descriptions 325
  29. Name index 331
https://doi.org/10.1075/chlel.xxxvi.17mur

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Preface vii
  4. General introduction xi
  5. Slavery, literature and the emotions 1
  6. Part One. Slavery, sentiment and affect
  7. Chapter 1. Slavery, sentimentality and the abolition of affect 18
  8. Chapter 2. Race and affect in Gustave de Beaumont’s Marie, ou L’esclavage aux Etats‑Unis 34
  9. Chapter 3. Touching difference and colonial space 50
  10. Part Two. Slavery between literary codes
  11. Chapter 4. In search of home 78
  12. Chapter 5. Showing and feeling the atrocities of slavery 95
  13. Chapter 6. Politics and faith, slavery and abolition in nineteenth-century Brazilian literature 110
  14. Chapter 7. Melodramatic tableaux vivants 136
  15. Part Three. Pity, identification and interpellation
  16. Chapter 8. Before sentimental empire 158
  17. Chapter 9. “No one can imagine my feelings” 173
  18. Chapter 10. Orientalism, slavery and emotion 191
  19. Chapter 11. Haunting slavery 207
  20. Part Four. Affective ties
  21. Chapter 12. Testamentary manumission and emotional bonds in eighteenth-century Saint-Domingue 226
  22. Chapter 13. Affection amidst domination in a post-slavery society 239
  23. Chapter 14. Bárbora and Jau 254
  24. Part Five. First-person voices
  25. Chapter 15. Scenes of emotion in French early-modern travel writing from the Caribbean 272
  26. Chapter 16. Fear and love in Matanzas 289
  27. Chapter 17. The blood-stained-gate 307
  28. Volume 1. Biographical descriptions 325
  29. Name index 331
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