Abraham Lincoln: The Great Emancipator

Abraham Lincoln: The Great Emancipator, a man raised from humble origins, top hat, sixteenth President of the United States, Preserver of the Union, and a common man; throughout the entirety of the semester, we saw these stereotypes of President Lincoln in the readings and films we watched each week. Once we delved further into the semester, however, we learned that these stereotypes were a direct result of the slanted sense of historical memory that we were taught in our history books. The more works we read and watched, the more diverse and complex Mr. Lincoln seemed to be from those history books; he went from a martyr dying for his beliefs to the worst president of his time, from a savior to the African Americans to King Africanus the racist,

Immediately, we saw a contrast in the overall demeanor of the characters of Abraham Lincoln. The movie focused on the powerful, God-like aspects of Mr. Lincoln as he confidently wielded a shiny, silver axe and never seemed to question any of his decisions. Even when he came to the tough decision of whether or not to bring his son Willie back from the dead and make him into a vampire, he specifically told his wife and close friends he would not because of his belief on the evils of vampirism. If we took a look at President Lincoln’s attitude in the novel, however, he was much more susceptible to the feelings of a normal human being, such as grief and depression. After the death of his beloved Ann Rutledge, Lincoln stated his depressed, suicidal thoughts when he said, “I do not wish to live without her” (Grahame-Smith, pg. 159). Compared to the movie, the novel knocked Abe’s confidence level down several notches so that a common man reader could relate more to President Lincoln. Also, as we looked further into the movie, we saw something for the first time in relation to Mary Todd Lincoln: she made a constructive effort in the advancement of Abraham Lincoln’s character instead of nagging Lincoln throughout their marriage until she later became depressed. Mary Todd’s demeanor matched suit with Lincoln’s powerfulness in the movie, and we saw her play an active role in ending the Civil War by delivering the silver to the Union Army. In the novel, it was the same story we saw all semester with Mary Todd. Her opinion or voice contained little to no value, and she thought that “the only peace in this [her] life is the end of it” (Grahame-Smith, pg. 284). Another crucial contrast within the film and the book was Mr. Lincoln’s sidekicks. Abe was accompanied by a black man that he had met in his past while he watched a slave woman be