Analysis of Frederick Douglass s Narrative 
Tony Chan
Sep, 31st, 2014
AP language & Composition
Mr. Crutchfield
Frederick Douglass’s autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, has received generally positive reviser and reached the bestseller immediately once published. These achievements were definitely exceptional and extraordinary for a slave living nineteenth century America, where slaves were refrain from gaining literacy in everywhere of the nation. Therefore, the following article is going to analysis the narrative from three perspectives—ethical, logical and emotional appeals and see how justified his indomitable view that slavery is injustice. Frederick Douglass, a black slave previously, witnessed the inhumane slavery tragedies and therefore able to unfurled his narrative in a first-person perspective and a chronological timeline. More importantly, he was one of the very few slaves who managed to gain literacy, which made him became the “monopoly source of slave narrative”. That Douglass possessed this monopoly astonished the public and raised his credibility quickly and significantly. In deed, contemporary social background has predestined the scanty of lettered slave, as further proved in the text “If you teach a nigger how to read, there would be no keeping him”. The thought that “slaves should not be permitted the right to gain literacy” entrenched so deeply in people’s mindset that it resulted in a lacking of reliable narrative sources. That Douglass was about to write drew public attention, put him under the limelight, and made him the only loud voice that had tremendously increase his credibility. In addition, Douglass succeeds in using a chronological flow of narrative that clearly recounts his previous miserable life condition under which he bear and manifests how the idea of “freedom” had gradually swell in his mind. The chronological accounts testify his previous encounters from the very beginning of the narrative “My first mistress was a
Sep, 31st, 2014
AP language & Composition
Mr. Crutchfield
Frederick Douglass’s autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, has received generally positive reviser and reached the bestseller immediately once published. These achievements were definitely exceptional and extraordinary for a slave living nineteenth century America, where slaves were refrain from gaining literacy in everywhere of the nation. Therefore, the following article is going to analysis the narrative from three perspectives—ethical, logical and emotional appeals and see how justified his indomitable view that slavery is injustice. Frederick Douglass, a black slave previously, witnessed the inhumane slavery tragedies and therefore able to unfurled his narrative in a first-person perspective and a chronological timeline. More importantly, he was one of the very few slaves who managed to gain literacy, which made him became the “monopoly source of slave narrative”. That Douglass possessed this monopoly astonished the public and raised his credibility quickly and significantly. In deed, contemporary social background has predestined the scanty of lettered slave, as further proved in the text “If you teach a nigger how to read, there would be no keeping him”. The thought that “slaves should not be permitted the right to gain literacy” entrenched so deeply in people’s mindset that it resulted in a lacking of reliable narrative sources. That Douglass was about to write drew public attention, put him under the limelight, and made him the only loud voice that had tremendously increase his credibility. In addition, Douglass succeeds in using a chronological flow of narrative that clearly recounts his previous miserable life condition under which he bear and manifests how the idea of “freedom” had gradually swell in his mind. The chronological accounts testify his previous encounters from the very beginning of the narrative “My first mistress was a