ipl-logo

The Passing Of Grandison Short Story

558 Words3 Pages

Family may not seem like a huge deal to some people and some generations, but there is not one simple definition of what family is. One can say that a family is a group of people that share a certain bond. During slavery, family meant everything, and family is all that the slaves had, unless their masters separated them because they knew family meant the world to the slaves. In the narrative of the life of Olaudah Equiano, Equiano’s bond with his sister was exceedingly cherished. In the narrative of Harriet Jacobs, Jacobs’ children was all she had. In the short story, “The Passing of Grandison,” the author, Charles W. Chesnutt, had a different view on family because the slave, Grandison, had a close bond with his master and his master’s family. …show more content…

Slaves had no ties on family. Jacobs fell in love with a man, but no matter what her lover would never have any say over her. Jacobs ends up having two children, and they mean the world to her. Jacobs finally escapes, but she ends up staying in an attic of a shed for 7 years so she could hear her children playing outside. She could not bear the thought of being apart from her children. Jacob suffered for seven years in a tiny attic just to hear their voices. Family meant everything to her. Jacobs would have went to the ends of the earth for her children, and her family was the only thing good in her life. Jacobs concept of family was a powerful bond that she could not imagine losing. So far family has been a blood relation, a bond, but in the short story, “The Passing of Grandison,” Grandison was a slave that respected and cherished the family that owned him. He did everything he could to please his master. He was faithful and never abandoned the family that owned him. He did everything he was asked, and he never disappointed. Grandison knew what he had was good, and he never wanted to lose that. His master meant the world to him, and that was his concept of what a family was. Grandison had a strong bond with the family who owned him. Grandison trusted

Show More
Related

  • Fredrick Douglass And Harriet Jacobs Narrative Analysis

    520 Words  | 3 Pages

    The emotional and sexual abuse was awful for Jacobs. In her narrative she talks about how horrible it really was for women "My master began to whisper foul words in my ear." Her master told her she was property "He told me I was his property; that I must be subject to his will in all things." She says how she had to give up their children "The children were sold to a slave-trader,

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Equiano And Rowlandson

    127 Words  | 1 Pages

    The worst bearing of both Rowlandson and Equiano has to face was being separated from their own love ones. Rowlandson was separated from her family and relations when her village was attacked then eventually lost her only child that was with her. Nevertheless, Equiano also endured tormented pain when he was parted from his sister while she was the only comfort to him at once. He was a young boy in a fearful atmosphere with nothing to convey a positive perspective. “It was vain that [they] besought than not to part us; she was torn from [him], and immediately carried away, while [he] was left in a state of distraction not to be describe”.

    Read More

  • Douglas And Jacobs Journey Through Slavery

    102 Words  | 1 Pages

    The two authors, harriet jacobs and frederick douglas, use thir autobiographical narratives to show their journeys through slavery. Their stories show how their self-transformation came to be and the struggles they both faced in slavery to reconstruct their identity. In escaping the circumstances of their birth, and early life, Douglass and Jacobs formed new identities free from the physical and psychological bonds of slavery. These newfound identities are focused ahead toward a life of freedom forged by the continual resistance. Douglass, Jacobs, and fuller are extraordinary people that represent different movements or values throughout our history, that it represents the American Identity.

    Read More

  • The Narrative Of The Life Of Frederick Douglass Convey The Loss Of Her Family

    93 Words  | 1 Pages

    This passage appears in Frederick Douglass’s autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Douglass narrates his disgust with slavery and more specifically how his grandmother was wrongfully treated and the overall ingratitude slave-owners had toward her. Douglas explains how although his Grandmother cared so much for everyone else all through her life yet she got nothing but torture in return. In the end she is left alone with just loneliness of what then were distant memories of her family which had been ruined through the malicious acts of

    Read More

  • Motivation Of Family In Night By Elie Wiesel

    1201 Words  | 5 Pages

    Family is one of the biggest impact on people's lives in numerous ways. They help to teach each other perseverance even in the toughest times. In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel, Elie was able to survive the countless nights in the concentration camps because he knew he had his father right by his side throughout it all. In the novel Sold by Patricia McCormick, young Lakshmi did not have her family in person with her at the Happiness House, but she had them in her thoughts constantly. It was these thoughts that allowed her to keep going even when nothing was what she thought it would be.

    Read More

  • Nightjohn Character Analysis

    525 Words  | 3 Pages

    In “Nightjohn” by Gary Paulsen, Nightjohn and Sarny, live difficult lives of slavery. With no freedom, and Sarny’s wish to learn, Nightjohn is in desperate need to teach Sarny to read and write, to able to write to others to teach them about the bads things of slavery. Through the story’s brave characters, description of hardships they, and a beautiful picture of their bravery they have, readers understand that Gary Paulsen is expressing the idea that helping others, is worth sacrificing yourself. Nightjohn left his Family behind, so he could teach slaves to read and write. In the movie Nightjohn, Sarny tells us how Nightjohn told her that he left his family behind.

    Read More

  • The Narrative Of The Life Of Fredrick Douglass

    377 Words  | 2 Pages

    Douglass recounts his own life events to show the difficulties faced when a master plays the role of a father. He explains that the vile desires of the owner will destroy the lives of his children, “The master is forced to sell his mulatto children or constantly whip them out of deference to the feelings of his white wife“ (Douglass 17). This situation destroys the

    Read More

  • Frederick Douglass Literary Analysis

    799 Words  | 4 Pages

    Through Douglass’s writing, the reader learns of how slavery takes its toll, not just on the slaves, but on everyone involved. Even the purest soul is destroyed, both the slave and the slave

    Read More

  • Harriet Ann Jacobs Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl

    769 Words  | 4 Pages

    My father was a carpenter, and considered so intelligent and skilful in his trade, that, when buildings out of the common line were to be erected, he was sent for from long distances, to be head workman. On condition of paying his mistress two hundred dollars a year, and supporting himself, he was allowed to work at his trade, and manage his own affairs. His strongest wish was to purchase his children; but, though he several times offered his hard earnings for that purpose, he never succeeded.” (page 820) Harriet Ann Jacobs was born into slavery in Edenton, North Carolina in 1813. Jacobs grew up in a family where her father was able to keep her and her brother together without being separated.

    Read More

  • Jacobs And Frederick Douglass Analysis

    328 Words  | 2 Pages

    Fredrick Douglas and Harriet Jacobs both reveal captivating accounts of their personal experiences of slavery and their fight for freedom and equality. Both speak of the immortality of the physical and mental abuse when depicting the “brutal whippings”, mental deception, as well as the heart ache of never seeing your family members. They found favor with masters who would allow them to learn to read and write and eventually freedom in the north. However, what is revealed so often, and is still very prevalent today is male privilege. The difference between male and female provides explanation not only for many of the differences of the writing styles that are shared in Douglass’s and Jacobs’s autobiographies, but also for the accounts of

    Read More

  • Rot And Ruin Character Analysis

    800 Words  | 4 Pages

    In Rot & Ruin, the author uses the theme of family being important. Here is a example of the theme from the book “He barely liked his family-and by family he meant his older brother. Tom.” The conflict is that Benny and Tom do not have a good relationship and have grudges against each other. If you hold grudges against your family or do not have a good relationship with your family, you will have no one to fall back on and you will be by yourself.

    Read More

  • Frederick Douglass: The Separation Of Life

    289 Words  | 2 Pages

    My mother was dead; my grandmother lived far off, so that I seldom saw her. I had two sisters and one brother that lived in the same house with me; but the early separation of us from our mother had well-nigh blotted the fact of our relationship from our memories. I looked for home elsewhere, and was confident of finding none which I should relish less than the one which I was leaving. If, however, I found in my new home hardship, hunger, whipping, and nakedness, I had the consolation that I should not have escaped any one of them by staying.” (5.6), Douglass didn’t really feel anything when he left his home, because his home wasn’t the same when his mother

    Read More

  • Importance Of Family In The Odyssey

    803 Words  | 4 Pages

    The love of a family is life’s greatest blessing. In life, there is a universal desire for oneness among people—we want to belong. It is why we collaborate, support common causes, cheer for sports teams, feel nationalism; it’s why we build villages, towns, and cities. Families are where we connect ourselves in relationships to past, current, and future generations. For many, family is not only a blessing, but our greatest accomplishment.

    Read More

  • Henrietta Lacks: A Literary Analysis

    1727 Words  | 7 Pages

    Family, for most people, is defined as a sort of safe haven for people to go to. For others, families may be fragmented, split, or may have wrong ideals as a whole. Broken families, while they may have a long lasting effect on the spouses, can also have a detrimental, long-lasting effect on the children of these marriages which can lead to certain mental illnesses. For example, in the story of the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Deborah faces the emotional effects of her mother’s death. Other stories such as “A Rose for Emily”, show how Emily 's fathers parenting techniques and a lack of a mother figure burdened her future.

    Read More

  • Family Definition Essay

    1100 Words  | 5 Pages

    “Family” is a hard word to create a concrete definition for. If one were to ask three random people on the street, it is likely they will receive three completely different answers to defining a family. The textbook definition of family according to the etymology dictionary is: “Origin in early 15c. “servants of a household” from Latin familia “family servants, domestics collectively, the servants in a household.” The traditional dictionary describes family in a more narrow fashion stating, “a basic social unit consisting of parents and their children, considered as a group, whether dwelling together or not.”

    Read More

More about The Passing Of Grandison Short Story

Open Document