AP Lang Douglass Essay
The Liberating Power of Music
In his autobiography "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave,” Frederick Douglass uses various rhetorical techniques to illustrate how slaves use music as a form of expression of their sorrow and grief. He describes how music, more specifically in the form of singing, liberates the deep despair and anguish of his subjugated people.
Music is typically seen an expression of joy and satisfaction, however, through his own personal experience Douglass exposes the true meaning behind the sorrowful songs of the slaves. He reveals their significance when he states, “They would sing, as a chorus, to words to which to many would seem jargon, but which, nevertheless were full of meaning to themselves (Douglass 11),” stating that he too at first did not comprehend the “incoherent songs (Douglass 11),” Then he goes on to explain, ”They told a tale of woe which was then all together behind my feeble comprehension; they were tones loud, long, and deep; they breathed the prayer and complaint of souls boiling over with the bitterest anguish (Douglass 11,).”, smoothly intergrading the use of alteration (repetition the letters W, T, L, and B), and metaphor comparing each and every tone to a call of prayer to depict the great depth of misery and helplessness of his people. Then Douglass goes in even more depth to explain further the extent to which the slaves were suffering. He states “Every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance from chains (Douglass 12),” metaphorically associating the condition of a slave with that of a miserable prisoner bounded by chains, showing how profoundly desperate their cries of pleas were. To further depict the horrid connotation hidden behind the songs, he says “Those songs still follow me…with the soul-killing effects of slavery (Douglass 12). “, personifying the song as haunting ghostly subjects, “following” him even as a freed man. Showing the extent to which
In his autobiography "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave,” Frederick Douglass uses various rhetorical techniques to illustrate how slaves use music as a form of expression of their sorrow and grief. He describes how music, more specifically in the form of singing, liberates the deep despair and anguish of his subjugated people.
Music is typically seen an expression of joy and satisfaction, however, through his own personal experience Douglass exposes the true meaning behind the sorrowful songs of the slaves. He reveals their significance when he states, “They would sing, as a chorus, to words to which to many would seem jargon, but which, nevertheless were full of meaning to themselves (Douglass 11),” stating that he too at first did not comprehend the “incoherent songs (Douglass 11),” Then he goes on to explain, ”They told a tale of woe which was then all together behind my feeble comprehension; they were tones loud, long, and deep; they breathed the prayer and complaint of souls boiling over with the bitterest anguish (Douglass 11,).”, smoothly intergrading the use of alteration (repetition the letters W, T, L, and B), and metaphor comparing each and every tone to a call of prayer to depict the great depth of misery and helplessness of his people. Then Douglass goes in even more depth to explain further the extent to which the slaves were suffering. He states “Every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance from chains (Douglass 12),” metaphorically associating the condition of a slave with that of a miserable prisoner bounded by chains, showing how profoundly desperate their cries of pleas were. To further depict the horrid connotation hidden behind the songs, he says “Those songs still follow me…with the soul-killing effects of slavery (Douglass 12). “, personifying the song as haunting ghostly subjects, “following” him even as a freed man. Showing the extent to which