The Christianity in Uncle Tom’s Cabin

The reason why I choose this particular book:

Uncle Tom’s Cabin is one of the most famous books in the world. It is so famous that people are capable of describing someone as an “Uncle Tom” or a “Simon Legree,” even of snickering at the death of “Little Eva” without altogether remembering that they have, in fact, never read Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

I choose this particular book because the garish dramatizations of Uncle Tom flourished for decades after the Civil War, when it was natural for the North to be complacent about the end of slavery without concerning itself about the actual condition of the “freedmen.” These dramatizations, flourishing in one provincial “opery house” after another (but not in the South, where the book was still hated as a paramount example of Yankee interference with the South’s “peculiar incidents”) emphasized the most melodramatic, seemingly improbable incidents in the novel. The most famous of these was Eliza Harris’s leap from ice floe to ice floe in the Ohio River, her “chile” in her arms, rushing just ahead of wolves as she makes her way to freedom in Ohio from Kentucky, where her supposedly decent master, Mr. Shelby, has been forced to sell her to the vile slave trader Healey. Though the book Mrs. Stowe’s shows a dawning awareness that slavery is not just individual cruelty or indifference but part of a vast interlocking social process based on profit whatever the human cost. Slavery was hardly an isolated example of man’s rapacity that supports slavery in this Christian church-going society, she can teach her white middle-class readers to look at their own lives and pious professions.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Abstract：

Uncle Tom’s Cabin is one of the most famous books in the world. It is so famous that people are capable of describing someone as an “Uncle Tom” or a “Simon Legree,” even of snickering at the death of “Little Eva” without altogether remembering that they have, in fact, never read Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

There are no novels in Mrs. Stowe’s description of Eliza’s escape. Uncle Tom on the stage showed just how easy it was for Americans after the Civil War to forget the moral passion that Mrs. Stowe had brought to her indictment of slavery —a moral passion that in the book is the most powerful antagonist of slavery and one so worked on people’s feeling from 1852 to the end of the Civil War that no other single book can be said to have contributed so much to the end of slavery.

As for reading the book, the study of character allusions, criticisms and genre is essential for a full understanding of the novel. The essay will analyze the novel in the following aspects: The brief introduction of Harriet Beecher Stowe; The Plot of the Novel; The character allusions; The criticisms; The genre.

Key word:

Character allusions

Criticisms

Genre

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

1. Brief Introduction of Harriet Beecher Stowe

Harriet Beecher Stowe was an American abolitionist and author. Stowe’s novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) depicted life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the United States and United Kingdom and made the political issues of the 1850s regarding slavery tangible to millions, energizing anti-slavery forces in the American North, while provoking widespread anger in the South. Upon meeting Stowe, Abraham Lincoln allegedly remarked, “So you're the little lady who started this great war!” The quote is regarded as apocryphal.

Mrs. Stowe had great dramatic instincts as a novelist. In this book she saw everything as a drama of polarities: slavery as sin versus Christian love; men as active in the cruel social process values. The widest opposition to slavery, she thought, stems from an individual’s outraged feeling. Throughout the book the social cruelty of slavery fully comes home only through the power of feeling, the “religion of the heart.” What made the book so tumultuous an indictment of slavery was Mrs. Stowe’s unwearied emphasis on the forcible breakup of slave families. So harshly to tear child from mother, husband from wife, was to expose the heartlessness and hypocrisy of slavery. Though slaves were nominally expected to be “Christians,” and were sometimes even married in the church, such marriages were not legally binding. Nothing so stirred Mrs. Stowe indignation as the common saying among slave owners, slave traders, slave catchers—repeated by the spoiled and selfish Mrs. St. Clare and other respectable wives of slave owners—“ they don’t have the same feelings that we do.”

2. Plot

In tile nineteenth century Uncle Tom’s Cabin sold more copies than any, book in the world except the Bible. It was quickly translated into thirty-seven languages and has never gone out of print. The book had far-reaching impact and deeply affected the national conscience of antebellum America. The Norton Critical Edition text is that of the 1852 book edition, published in two volumes by John P. Jewett and Company Boston; all original illustrations are included. Annotations are provided to assist the reader with obscure historical terms and biblical references.

“Backgrounds and Contexts” includes a wealth of historical documentation dealing with the issues of slave and abolitionism. Harriet Jacobs’s narrative of' her life as a fifteen-year-old slave, two epistolary accounts by ex-slave and abolitionist William Wells Brown that document events in Uncle Tom’s Cabin, two crucial excerpts from Stowe’s Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin that provide the real-life basis for characters and events in the novel, and accounts of Tom-Shows and the anti Uncle Tom literature that sprang up in response to the novel's publication. Illustrative material includes slave advertisements; runaway slave posters; illustrations for the first British edition of Uncle Tom's Cabin by Britain's premier illustrator, George Cruikshank; as well as popular illustrations from American editions of the novel “Criticism” is arranged under two headings: “Nineteenth-Century Re-views and Reception” includes critiques by George Sand, William G. Allen and Ethiop, George F. Itolmes, and Paul Laurence Dunbar, among others. “Twentieth-Century Criticism” collects five of the best essays written on the novel in this century; they are by James Baldwin, Jane P. Tompkins, Bobert S. Levinc, Hortense I. Spillers, and Christina Zwarg.

A Chronology of Stowe's life and work and a Selected Bibliography are also included.

3. Character Allusions

In order to make a comprehensive knowledge of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, I have first to briefly make character allusions which will help the development of the story and the understanding of the theme in the novel.

I. Tom

Tom, the protagonist of this novel, is obviously the Christ figure with black skin. Tom’s experience is quite similar to that of Jesus Christ. When Tom's first master, Mr. Shelby sells Tom to the coarse slave-dealer in financial straits, he betrays the loyalty of his most loyal slave since boyhood. Jesus is sold by his apostle Judas who is prompted by his avarice for money. So they are all betrayed and sold by the ones who are close to them. While he struggles with his faith, as Jesus does in the last hours of his life when he says, “my God, why have you forsaken me?” He never loses his simple faith. Tom's death scene also has striking likeness with that of Jesus Christ. Tom is flogged near to death, so is Jesus before his crucifixion. When Jesus dies, there are two criminals crucified together with him, one of whom believes Jesus is Messiah and is saved at the very moment and spot. Sambo and Qimbo, Degree’s two cruel overseers who in every sense are equal to criminals, are moved by Tom’s Christian fortitude and patience and are converted at the very moment and spot. Jesus is crucified to redeem sinners while Tom dies for the two runaway slaves, Cassy and Emmeline. They are all innocent, but all die for others. In essence, they all die for their faith and religious devotion. In fact, Tom dies as a “martyr” which is revealed by the title of chapter forty.

Tom is not only similar in his experience to Jesus Christ. More important, his temperament is like that of Jesus Christ. He is warm-hearted, faithful, forgiving and obedient.

Tom is full of love for his neighbors, blacks and whites. While he is at St.Clare’s home, he meets that pitiful, wretched old slave whose only left child is starved to death because she devotes all her time to tending her mistress and loses her milk, yet her mistress refuses to buy milk for her baby. Tom offers to carry her basket for her and sends the Gospel to her. Just as when Jesus sees sinners, he pities them, helps them, cures them and tells them “the good news”. Tom not only loves his fellow slaves, but white people. When he sees his second young handsome flighty master St Clare go to those wining parties, Tom goes down on his knees and pleads with him not to attend those revelries.

Tom is faithful to God and man. When he faces his third cruel master Simon Degree’s threatening and flogging, he doesn’t give up his faith in God and insists that his soul belongs to Him, not to him, though he bought him with twelve hundred dollars. Tom is also very faithful to man, such as his first and third masters who give him all their property to manage. Once, Mr. Shelby let him to go to Cincinnati alone to do business for him, Tom doesn’t run away, instead, he comes back because he thinks that his master trusts him and he mustn’t betray his master.

Forgiveness is Tom’s another distinctive characteristic. We can see it in Jesus Christ. Jesus forgives those who persecute him for he prays, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”. Tom also forgives his third cruel master Legree and Legree’s two overseers who harshly flogged him by saying, “I forgive you, with all my soul!”

Tom is submissive and obedient but only to God. When Jesus is facing his immediate bitter death, he prays “yet, not my will but yours be done.” And when he learns he will be sold to the south, Tom says similar words, “The Lord's will be done!” But his obedience is not to everyone. For example, once Legree requires Tom to flog a weak slave woman, Tom refuses, saying, “I can’t feel it right to do” So his obedience is not blind. He only obeys what he believes right.

　　II. Little Eva

　　Another image is Evangeline St. Clare, namely, the “little Eva”. The name “Evangeline” definitely promotes the idea and image of angel. In appearance, she resembles an earthly angel-beautiful, always dressed in white. In spirit, she is full of love, like a good guardian angel. I still remember when her father asks her best life style, Eva answers that their way is the pleasantest because “it makes so many more people round you to love”. And also the reason she asks her father to buy Tom is “to make him happy”. When she hears the story of Prue, she doesn’t want to go out in her new carriage again for the terrible story. In her eyes, there are many puzzling things, such as why Prue is so unhappy, why Tom should be separated from his wife and children, why no one loves that black little girl, Topsy. What she only knows and does is to love all the people around her. She shares the Gospel with all her father's plantation slaves as well as questioning her own father's faith. This action by Eva saves many lost souls and gives them hope. It also prompts the soul-searching and self-reevaluation in her father. When dying, she gives every slave servant in her house a lock of fair golden hair, asking him or her to be Christians, so that they could see each other in heaven. Eva is delicate and dies early, which “dramatize the fact that she does not belong to the world. This is especially evident when the angel is a child, like Stowe’s Eva.”

　　III. Sambo and Qimbo

　　Sambo and Qimbo, Simon Legree’s two cruel henchmen, are obviously the images of the two criminals taken from the Bible who are crucified at the same time besides Jesus Christ when we see their roles in the process of Tom’s death. With the command of Legree, these two flog Tom near to the point of death. Yet, Tom's forgiveness, patience and fortitude even move these two villainous men. Then, Tom introduces Jesus Christ to them, and they are converted immediately. In the Bible, one criminal is also moved by Jesus and believes him, and his soul is saved at that moment. In fact, these two overseers take two different archetypes from the Bible, the one who flog Jesus Christ and the other who is saved through Jesus. So, Sambo and Qimbo possess two different roles at the same time.

　　IV. Eliza

The above four images (Tom, Eva, Sambo and Qimbo) are easy to find their respective archetypes in the Bible. Another more indirect one is Eliza who is like Israelites running away from Egypt where they are slaves to Canaan where they will have a new free happy life. Eliza’s running is guided by God all the way, as Israelites are guided by God who appears “in the pillars of cloud and fire”. Israelites’ passing through the Red Sea which “was turned into dry land by strong east wind" is a miracle. So is Eliza’s escape through jumping from one ice flow to another, which can’t be done without the “strength such as God gives only to the desperate”. If we say the Ohio River is like the Red Sea, then the lake between America and Canada is like the river Jordan that lies between terrible wilderness and wonderful Canaan. I call the Ohio River the Red Sea, not the river Jordan, because Eliza still has to endure many pains after her crossing of the Ohio River, just like Israelites still have to suffer much in the wilderness. While after crossing the lake, the land of freedom——Canada waits for her and her families. Eliza is an intriguing character. She is submissive to her master and mistress, yet her child’s imminent danger and her desire for her child’s freedom and well-being overrides her loyalty to them. Israelites betray Pharaoh for they also long for freedom and well-being.

In my opinion, all the characters in Uncle Tom’s Cabin can be put into four categories: perfect Christians, imperfect Christians, half-Christians and non-Christians. Tom and Eva are those rare real Christians or perfect Christians who really live up to the principles of the Bible. Imperfect Christians include those like Mrs. Shelby and Miss Ophelia. They believe God, but their selfishness or hypocrisy prevents them from being good Christians. There are also some half-Christians or going-to-be Christians, such as St. Clare and Gorge Harris. Simon Legree is a typical example of non-Christian whose tough nature refuses to be touched by any good word. This kind of categorizing might be oversimplifying. Yet, this is a pattern that I found in Uncle Tom's Cabin. So in this sense, Uncle Tom’s Cabin is a book soaked with spirit of Christianity.

4. Criticisms:

The book, although broadly and continually received in a positive light, has also caught a large amount of derision for its strange and random tone (which is also the reason so many others like it). One of the best-known critics is fantasy writer Terry Pratchett, who has openly stated that he dislikes the book.

5. Genre:

Uncle Tom’s Cabin is written in the sentimental and melodramatic style common to 19th century sentimental novels and domestic fiction (also called women’s fiction). These genres were the most popular novels of Stowe’s time and tended to feature female main characters and a writing style which evoked a reader’s sympathy and emotion. Even though Stowe’s novel differs from other sentimental novels by focusing on a large theme like slavery and by having a man as the main character, she still set out to elicit certain strong feelings from her readers (such as making them cry at the death of Little Eva). The power in this type of writing can be seen in the reaction of contemporary readers. Georgiana May, a friend of Stowe’s, wrote a letter to the author stating that, “I was up last night long after one o’clock, reading and finishing Uncle Tom’s Cabin. I could not leave it any more than I could have left a dying child.” Another reader is described as obsessing on the book at all hours and having considered renaming her daughter Eva.

Despite this positive reaction from readers, for decades literary critics dismissed the style found in Uncle Tom’s Cabin and other sentimental novels because these books were written by women and so prominently featured, “women’s sloppy emotions.” One literary critic said that had the novel not been about slavery, “it would be just another sentimental novel,” while another described the book as “primarily a derivative piece of hack work.” In The Literary History of the United States, George F. Whicher called Uncle Tom’s Cabin “Sunday-school fiction”, full of “broadly conceived melodrama, humor, and pathos.”

6. Comment:

I really appreciate the essence in Uncle’s Tom Cabin, that is to say, Christianity. Mrs. Stowe’s made great efforts to create a lot character of Christianity (perfect Christians, imperfect Christians, half-Christians and non-Christians) are echoing in the Bible. And I also appreciate Stowe’s way of solving slavery. I still remember when in a small hotel George Harris says to Mr. Wilson, “I’ll fight for my liberty to the last breath I breathe. You say your fathers did it; if it was right for them, it is right for me”, it seems that the author Mrs. Stowe herself agreed with George. Then does this mean Mrs. Stowe advocated slaves to fight for their freedom through violence? Or the aim of her writing the book was to spark the Civil War? We are almost temped to say “yes” to both questions with the two “evidences” cited above if we do not exam the whole book thoroughly. First, let's not forget that Mrs. Stowe herself was a devout Christian who wouldn’t advocate any form of violence. Second, we should notice that Mr. Wilson advised Harris he’d better not shoot. Third, we should also notice that Mr. Simeon, the fervent Quaker, regards fighting with flesh as a temptation though he believes Harris has the right to do it. In fact, Harris himself would rather “…be let alone-to go peacefully out of it”. So, in the case of George Harris, Mrs. Stowe only advocated limited passive resistance when the law of sacred family bond was violated by the system of slavery. But on the whole, she held with the view of nonviolent resistance. To be specific, she praised slaves’ spiritual and moral victory over slavery which can be seen from her most carefully portrayed protagonist Tom, a pious, submissive Christian, who was her ideal black. Moreover, for Mrs. Stowe, the solution to slavery lied mainly in the white, not in the black, which, of course, is rather absurd. By informing her white fellowmen of the evils of slavery, she wanted the Southern slave owners to free slaves voluntarily through Christian love, just as George Shelby does. Of course, this childish, utopian idea can’t come to true for the economy of South is based on the slavery system. Those plantation owners couldn't give up their property voluntarily, could they? She also wanted Northerners, especially the Church of the North to shoulder the responsibility of educating those future freed men.

Conclusion:

To sum up, Christianity played a very important role in Harriet Beecher Stowe's writing which inevitably influenced greatly the portraiture of characters in Uncle Tom's Cabin and also Mrs. Stowe's own solution to slavery. The author of this thesis intends to interpret Uncle Tom's Cabin in the light of Christianity rather than anti-slavery and feminism to show a new outlook of it. Christianity is an indispensable part of western cultures and an important element in Uncle Tom's Cabin, yet most Chinese readers are not familiar with it. So the author in this thesis hopes to help Chinese readers appreciate it better by informing them more about Christianity in it.

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