Everyone remembers when they learned to read and write some more than others. Even well known people like Frederick Douglass and Malcolm X. They wrote narratives, “Learning to Read And Write” by Frederick Douglass and “Learning to Read” by Malcolm X, to show us when, where, and how they learned to read and write. Both authors go through struggles that we would never think could or would happen. Even though they go through struggles they still became eager to learn more to better themselves. It gave them power they never thought they could achieve. They have many similar and different trials that they went through so they could learn how to read and write. They both were in bad situations when they decided to learn to read and write. Douglass …show more content…
How? Malcolm taught himself completely while, Douglass taught himself some but mostly learned from others. Douglass made friends with all the white boys he met in the streets and converted them into teachers, he also bribed the poor boys to teach him with bread (Douglass 101). He ultimately got the idea to learn to write when he was in the shipyards. He learned letters and then was able to make four letter words which he used when he challenged other boys that he could write better than them, which gave him a good number of writing lessons ( Douglass 105). He also taught himself to write using a board fence, brick wall, and pavement as his copy book and a piece of chalk as his pen (Douglass 105). With Malcolm he completely taught himself how to write and read when he copied the dictionary. He did everything in the isolation of his cell where he could focus on only what he was doing and also staying up past lights out when he progressed to really serious reading ( Malcolm 2). They both had to sneak to read Douglass more than Malcolm. For Malcolm he only had to sneak to read after lights out. In contrast, Douglass would sneak books when he would go on errands so he wouldn’t get in trouble with his mistress and master, because they would punish him if they found
For Frederick Douglass, learning to read was more difficult because he had to hide that he was learning to read and write. It was difficult for him because it was prohibited for slaves to know how to read and write. He started to learn to read because help him at first. Then he started getting white boys to help him learn without their knowledge of what they were doing. Another way that he was learning was by reading a book when he was running errands for his mistress. Frederick Douglass learn to write by walking through a shipyard and learning the letter that were written on wooden plaques. He started out by copying the letters L, A, S, F on timber he found in the shipyard. But at the end of his journey he accomplished his goal with unknown help from people he was appreciated. For Malcolm, it was a bit easier because he had books from the prison 's library at his disposal for when eve he needed them. He also had notebooks and pens he could write with. Malcolm learned to read and write by copying the entire dictionary and then repeating what he wrote to himself. He read a lot of books to improve his vocabulary and because they made him feel free. Frederick loved to read to know what was going on with him and his fellow slaves. He started to hate being a slave and to think that white people were cruel once he started to understand what was going on thanks to learning how to
From an early age, Frederick Douglass refused to accept the life of confinement into which he was born. The way he learned to write is a fine example of his exceptional resourcefulness and persistence to rise above. In The Norton Anthology of World Literature, Douglass's depiction of his self-education can be found on page 94...
Frederick Douglas was born into the slave trade in Talbot County, Maryland. He was sent to work on a plantation for the Hugh’s Family for about seven years. This is the location where his learning truly began. His mistress was a “kind, tender-hearted, woman” who treated Frederick as a human instead of property the family owned. This was a dangerous thing for both parties at this time in history it was considered wrong. Frederick States “Slavery proved as injurious to her as it did to me” which I see the connection he had made to her change of personality because of slavery. She had heavenly qualities that slavery was able to divest from her. It was injurious to Fredrick not only for the lashings a salve would receive but to have his former teacher stopped teaching him. Beginning to follow her husband’s teaching who forbid her to teach the slaves she became violent. Douglas says “nothing made her more angry than to see me with a newspapers” and that resulted in her rushing Frederick with a face of fury taking the paper away. His former mistress who gave him his first lesson expressed her new found apprehension to education and slavery co-existing. His mistress gave him an inch by teaching Douglas the alphabet now he was about to take the mile. He began to make friends with the white boys he would meet in the streets while running errands in town. Frederick always took a book and bread when he left for town. The boys who were willing to teach him would be paid in bread which he was allowed to have plenty of. The white boys who were teaching him where considerable poor in comparison to the family that referred to Frederick “chattel”. Young Frederick spoke powerful words to two his teachers who lived on Phil...
Many people take for grant of the freedom we have, but Douglass shows that having freedom means having the ability to control one’s own destiny. Douglass was a slave who like any other slaves cannot be educated. Douglass finds this out by accident when he overhears the reasons why it was illegal for them to get education- it because the white slave owners did not want slaves to gain knowledge as it will bring disorder and rebel against slavery. As a result of this finding, Douglass seeks out his own education. One of his methods of learning how to read is by exchanging foods for learning to read. During the slavery, poverty also affected all different people, so Douglass would give breads to poor children and for exchange teach Douglass some words. For Douglass learning meant punishments or even death, but he takes the risk and did all he can to gain knowledge because this is the only way he can be free. He demonstrates to people that education is powerful and the way one can truly be self-governed. Douglass story is a reminder to always appreciate education and to take the most out of learning because in the end no one can take away what’s in our
As a relatively young man, Frederick Douglass discovers, in his Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, that learning to read and write can be his path to freedom. Upon discovering that...
In conclusion, two important literary nonfiction forms that Frederick Douglass identifies in “How I Learned to Read and Write” are a sense of place, and personal experience. Douglass’s essay executed examples of these two forms separately as well as together, numerous times throughout his piece. Douglass centralized his writing around his personal experiences, studying and accomplishing the ability to read and write despite the many difficulties he faced. The portrayal of a sense of place ingrained throughout his writing sheds a light on the locations and stages in his life he experienced these events. He was able to successful correlate these two forms together to create an unforgettable and inspirational story. A story of overcoming adversity, and achieving the impossible in a time whenever all odds were against him.
This is the time period where he learned to read and write. His mistress, who was a compassionate lady, was secretly teaching Douglass behind her husband’s back. She sparked Douglass’s desire to become a literate person. Mrs. Hugh taught him the alphabet and, soon after, her husband found out what she had done. He explained that teaching a slave put their family in a dangerous situation and she became harsher than her husband. Douglass’s desire still urged on and he found his own way to learn to read. Douglass used his resources to his advantage. He used bread form the Hugh’s kitchen, which was available to him, to bribe the poor white boys and, in turn, they would teach him how to read. These boys then became his unofficial teachers. Douglass says of the boys, “I wished I could be as free as they would be when they got to be men” (62). Douglass felt that learning to read would give him a sense of independence, but yet he would never be truly free because of
Here I was once again staring down at the open test on my desk and trying desperately to read the words staring back at me but to no avail. When I look up I know that I’ll see my classmates’ pencils moving quickly across the test while others have already turned it over on their desk. I could feel my teacher standing over me concerned that all that was written on my test was my name. Finally, she asked me what the problem was; did I not know what a word meant? If I didn’t it wasn’t a problem. I could just point to it and she would tell me. So I did and I pointed to the first word of the first question, then the following word, and the following word until she had translated the whole question for me. Not that it made much of a difference since
During the days of slavery many slaves did not know the alphabet, let alone reading and writing. Douglass feels distant from his close ones and is often stressed about his situation. Sometimes, he would be so tensed that he feels that there is no other option than to take his own life in order to be free and escape the misery of slavery. Frederick Douglass was stressed and he would find himself “regretting [his] own existence, and now wishing [himself] dead;” he had no doubt that “[he] should have killed [himself]” (146). Douglass is clearly suffering from the knowledge he gains because it leads him to be estranged and makes him often want to end his own life. This is not a good practice for anyone in life for the reason that life is precious and it should never be taken for granted. Before Douglass learns how to read, he was content with his condition as a slave, but this proved a cruel incident that occurred in his life by making him
Douglass and Malcolm X shared similarities in having an ambition to achieve how to properly read and write, they were self taught, and made use of their circumstance no matter the difficulty. Douglass and Malcolm X were different throughout their educational background, circumstances,and slightly different ways of educating themselves. Douglass was a slave with no educational background who wanted to learn how to read and write knowing that it was better opportunities that were being held from him while being a slave. He took risk and every opportunity he could take , “ I was compelled to resort to various stratagems” (Douglass 100). With his circumstances as a slave he had to keep his reading and writing on low key due to the possible consequences of being caught with learning materials. Malcolm X was a criminal with some educational background. He had a desire to express his thoughts and knowledge but was held back by his eighth grade education and imprisonment at that moment. With this obstacle, he wanted to be able to speak properly and to share his thoughts in a proper letter to the great Mr. Elijah Muhammad, “How could I sound writing in slang,...say[ing] it, something such as, ‘Look, daddy, let me pull your coat about a cat, Elijah Muhammad-’ ” (Malcolm X
He had long fought to learn to read and was so excited and eager to do so, he never expected the circumstances of this to be as dehumanizing as they were. He regretted learning to read because it brought him nothing but desperation, he learned his awful truth and that of his fellow slaves. "It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy." (Douglass, 24) The truth was that the more he learned the more he became aggravated, he knew there was not much he could do. It brought his moral down along with many other feelings, even a slave like Frederick had learned the awful feeling of
In the essay “Learning to Read and Write,” Frederick Douglass illustrates how he successfully overcome the tremendous difficulties to become literate. He also explains the injustice between slavers and slaveholders. Douglass believes that education is the key to freedom for slavers. Similarly, many of us regard education as the path to achieve a career from a job.
... and unhappy (Douglass 78).” Learning how to read was as big a step towards freedom for Douglass as it was back. It made him aware of the circumstances but it also made him realize how difficult it would be for him to ever find himself a free man. However, knowledge overpowers ignorance in the sense that his masters could never take his ability to read away from him and because Douglass now knew his condition, he knew that he deserved a better life.
Douglass’ was to free himself from slaver, while Twain’s was to come back to his village with glory. Everyone also had different ways to get an education—Douglass’ was to learn from the white children in his neighborhood secretly, while Twain’s was handed to him by Mr. B. But the different ways of learning do not really matter, as their education resulted in them realizing that knowledge would not always bring beauty to life, if anything, knowledge would usually strip the beauty off life. I guess, knowledge is not all it’s cracked up to
In Learning to Read, by Malcolm X, he talks about his studies while in prison. Having only up to an eighth grade education, Malcolm X struggles with reading and writing. The main reason he decided to learn how to read was because of the letters he received while in prison, primarily from Elijah Muhammad. (X 354). He wasn’t able to write responses to them like he wanted to without using slang. Along with not being able to write letters, Malcolm X couldn’t read books without skipping over most of the words, thus motivating him to study an entire dictionary. With the use of said dictionary, he also improved his penmanship by writing down every word, definition, and punctuation he saw. (X 355). Once he memorized the whole dictionary, he was then able to read books. There wasn’t a moment where Malcolm wasn’t reading even at night when the lights were out, he still managed to use the little bit of light shining into his cell to read.