Harriet Jacobs is a helluva woman

When reading the first chapters of Harriet Jacobs Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, I could not help but to compare and contrast it with the previous reading of Frederick Douglass’s narrative. One of the most apparent things both authors have in common is the use of biblical references. She uses the biblical passage “Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.” Jacobs however, hearkens more towards using the proper morality provided in the text of the bible, while Douglass uses the hypocrisy of slavery and Christianity to discredit the slaveholders religious grounds.
The strongest language I found in reading the first few chapters was Jacob’s discussions and experiences with death; particularly the idea of death being better than slavery. When her father dies, it’s her grandmother who comforts her by saying “Perhaps they have been kindly taken from the evil days to come.” (pg 16). The thought that death can be an escape from the cruelties of chattel slavery and in the eyes of a slave, the world, is incredibly powerful. The reader cannot help but be petrified by the idea that death is better than slavery, but Jacobs does a great job at evoking that thought. She does another great job of doing so when describing the death a mother and the child she gave birth to on page 20. Because she is giving birth to the child of her master, the mistress goes to unmeasured lengths of cruelty in order to get revenge. She allows the woman’s child to die, and leaves her in a room screaming in agony. Jacobs speaks beautifully when she ands the chapter with “The poor black woman had but the one child, whose eyes she saw closing in death, while she thanked god for taking her away from the greater bitterness of life.”