Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe, was the second best selling novel in 1852 and the first widely read political novel. Her novel is considered by some to be the starting point of the Civil War because of the intense conflict between the North and the South reflected through the book. It was reported that during a conversation between President Lincoln and Stowe, Lincoln addressed her as the “little woman...that started this great war”(Gordon-Reed 1). This suggests that Stowe’s novel was so compelling that it sparked a war. The North and South had extremely different views on how the issue of slavery should be addressed. Stowe observed the different viewpoints of Americans at this time as well as the different types of slaves and their perspectives and wove them into her novel. In Uncle Tom’s Cabin, the arguments of the Northern and Southern treatment of slaves, Stowe’s outreach to the compassionate nature of women, and Stowe’s credibility emerge, proving she had an important impact on this period in our history. Historically, the North and the South have had very different viewpoints on the industry of slavery and much of the conflict …show more content…
She decided that the only logical reason that law could have been passed, would be because the people did not understand what the slaves endured. Uncle Tom’s Cabin explains possible journeys slaves had to live through. Also Stowe explains her opinion on slavery and provides ways to abolish slavery. Being very religious, she believed that the only way to be a perfect Christian was to be against slavery. Stowe stated many times that the way to end slavery was through Christian religion. Harriet Beecher Stowe opens the eyes of thousands through Uncle Tom’s Cabin by explaining the northern and southern treatment of Africans, reaching out to women’s maternal instincts, and explaining how she achieved her reliable
When Abraham Lincoln met Harriet Beecher Stowe, he said, “So, this is the little lady who made this big war”(“History.com Staff”2). After Stowe published Uncle Tom’s Cabin, there was a rumor that this book led to the Civil War. Uncle Tom’s Cabin turned a lot of people in the North against slavery. The people in the North wanted slavery to end which caused them to fight the South. The most important topic of Uncle Tom’s Cabin is that slavery was worse in the South than in the North. Slavery was worse in the South than in the North because of the hard labor, the freedom policy, and the treatment of the slaves.
Uncle Tom's Cabin is one of the most famous and popular pieces of Civil War literature. It was drawn from selected pieces of a real life memoir done by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Uncle Tom's Cabin was a book that drew many people into the fight over the institution of slavery. Northerners hailed the book saying it exposed the truth, while southern slaveholders and plantation owners claimed that it had many falsehoods in it. President Lincoln, when he met Stowe called her, "the little lady who started this big war."
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s book Uncle Tom’s Cabin was an amazing read that was truly inspiring. It was evident to me and clearly evident to others as well, that the book was written for a specific purpose. This purpose was to inform the American public of the horrors of slavery. The novel was set in the early 19th century. During this time period, slaves took up approximately 13% of the American population and for the most part worked on large plantations. Since very few people were plantation owners, or owned slaves for personal use, most of the American public did not have a great understanding of the hardships that an average slave had to go through. Through her writing, Harriet Stowe managed to illustrate perfectly what the American people had been unable to see. Stowe’s novel inspired people to push for the end of slavery in a way that debates and speeches could not have. The response from the novel was so incredible that it has been considered by many to have caused or at least influenced the American Civil War. This novel shows that the power of literature can be used as a weapon. It’s up to the author to decide if they want to use this power for good or for bad. Harriet Stowe decided to use her power for good by attempting to convince people to join the abolitionist movement. This can be shown through Tom’s characteristics, religion, the response the novel received from the north and south and through the historical facts(generally one sided) shown through Stowes writing.
I never thought that I would read a book over the summer, but over the course of these past two months, that changed. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” forever changed how I view slavery. I loved reading it. Throughout the whole novel, Stowe uses her experience and knowledge to portray the terrible hardships and struggles that slaves endured everyday. Not only does this book express the thoughts of the slaves and their faith in God, but also of the people around them. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” wanted so badly for America to give freedom and equality for all people, and that is what I enjoyed most while reading.
Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in 1852. This anti-slavery book was the most popular book of the 19th century, and the 2nd most sold book in the century, following only the Bible. It was said that this novel “led to the civil war”, or “the straw that broke the camel’s back”. After one year, 300,000 copies were sold in the U.S., and over 1 million were sold in Britain.
“As it is, we have the wolf by the ear, and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go. Justice is on one scale, and self-preservation in the other.” This quote said by Thomas Jefferson accurately depicted the political, economic, and social issues that were presented in the 1800s. The novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin written by Harriet Beecher Stowe created a massive awareness politically and socially for the abolitionist movement. Throughout Uncle Tom’s Cabin Stowe paints the picture of the cruel and unjust treatment of slaves on large plantations in the 1850s. Although Uncle Tom’s Cabin shows that large scale plantations showed empathy towards their slaves after the 1830s; however, Uncle Tom’s Cabin accurately depicts the lives of slaves after
Uncle Tom’s cabin was written by Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1852. It is an anti-slavery book that shows the reader the many sufferings endured by slaves in the period before the civil war. To the people of the modern day generation, these acts of slavery are unbelievable but the reader has to realize the fact that in those years, people suffered, to the point where they were just treated as property, where owners can do whatever they like and be disposed of or traded as if they were just material possessions and not even human. The book talks about the relationship between slaves and their masters as well as the role of women. As slavery was practiced during such times, Stowe tries to expose the difficult life people had in the past and how their faith in God helped them to endure all there hardships.
Uncle Tom’s Cabin is an anti-slavery novel written by Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1850s that “changed forever how Americans viewed slavery, the system that treated people as property”. (Harriet Beecher Stowe Center) This book “demanded that the United States deliver on the promise of freedom and equality, galvanized the abolition movement and contributed to the outbreak of the Civil War”. (Harriet Beecher Stowe Center) “The strength of Uncle Tom's Cabin is its ability to illustrate slavery's effect on families, and to help readers empathize with enslaved characters.” (Harriet Beecher Stowe Center) As Foner mentioned: “By portraying slaves as sympathetic men and women, and as Christians at the mercy of slaveholders who split up families and set bloodhounds on innocent mothers and children, Stowe’s melodrama gave the abolitionist message a powerful human appeal.” (472) With this novel, Stowe wanted to convince Christians that God doesn’t’ approve slavery, that it is evil which must be destroyed.
Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe is a classic novel that some people claimed evoked the American Civil War. Stowe motivated people to take sides over the issue of slavery by discussing the issue and showing the cruel aspects of it. The main focus of the novel was to show whites that African American’s have souls and feelings like any other human; it was common for whites at the time to view blacks as cattle. Families were separated, and the white people’s reasoning was that blacks did not feel the loss the same way a white person would. Stowe’s basic argument is that it is wrong to mistreat blacks because they suffer just as much as whites.
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, has had a tremendous impact on American culture, both then and now. It is still considered a controversial novel, and many secondary schools have banned it from their libraries. What makes it such a controversial novel? One reason would have been that the novel is full of melodrama, and many people considered it a caricature of the truth. Others said that she did not show the horror of slavery enough, that she showed the softer side of it throughout most of her novel. Regardless of the varying opinions of its readers, it is obvious that its impact was large.
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel, though fictional, did more to change the hearts of Americans who were standing on the edge abolitionism than any other work at that time. In fact, near the conclusion of the Civil War she was invited to the White House in order that President Lincoln might meet the “little woman that started this big war.” Stowe felt that she had an obligation to inform the world of what really went on in the South, what life was really like for slaves.
Harriet Beecher Stowe, a northern abolitionist, published her best-selling novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1852. Uncle Tom’s Cabin contracts the many different attitudes that southerners as well as northerners shared towards slavery. Generally, it shows the evils of slavery and the cruelty and inhumanity of the peculiar institution, in particular how masters treat their slaves and how families are torn apart because of slavery.
Even today, with literature constantly crossing more lines and becoming more shocking, Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin remains one of the most scandalous, controversial, and powerful literary works ever spilled onto a set of blank pages. Not only does this novel examine the attitudes of white nineteenth-century society toward slavery, but it introduces us to the hearts, minds and souls of several remarkable and unprecedented characters.
Rarely is one work of literature so significant that it has the ability to change a society or cascade it down a path of ruinous conflict. Uncle Tom’s Cabin, written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, is a work that provided such a catalytic occurrence. To this day, this work of fiction brilliance is considered one of the most instrumental American works to ever be published. Selling over a million copies in its first two years and being the second bestselling book next to the Bible, what makes this accomplishment even more incredible is the fact that a woman wrote this book during a period in history when women were not granted the ability to have roles of influence or leadership, in any society1. In 1852, when the book was published, women were nonetheless confined to domestic obligations. With the help of the books, Uncle Tom’s Cabin written by Harriet Beecher Stowe and Social Analysis: Linking Faith and Justice written by Joe Holland, one is able to understand how much of an impact Stowe had on America’s history with the way people viewed slavery. The percussion of Uncle Tom’s Cabin caused much conflict between the abolitionists and the antislavery citizens. This work is important to history because it created the idea of finding a place for religion in society, shone a light on how African American slaves were treated, pushed the United States to a realization with the idea of whether slavery could continue to be a cornerstone of American life and how it contributed to the beginning of the Civil War. As Abe Lincoln said of Stowe, “the little woman who started the Great War1.”
“So this is the little lady who made this big war.” Abraham Lincoln’s legendary comment upon meeting Harriet Beecher Stowe demonstrates the significant place her novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, holds in American history. Published in book form in 1852, the novel quickly became a national bestseller and stirred up strong emotions in both the North and South. The context in which Uncle Tom’s Cabin was written, therefore, is just as significant as the actual content. Among other things, Stowe’s publication of her novel was stimulated by the increasing tensions among the nation’s citizens and by her fervent belief that slavery was brutally immoral.