Reflections on Uncle Tom's Cabin on its 161st Anniversary

On March 20th 1852 - 161 years ago today - Uncle Tom's Cabin was first published as a two-volume book. Like many Victorian-era novels, it had previously been printed in magazine installments, but now the public could treasure the complete work that was already stirring the nation.

Last week I finished what has so-far been my favorite read of the year: Mightier Than the Sword: Uncle Tom's Cabin and the Battle for America by David S. Reynolds. I must confess that I kept this book out of the library almost a month past its "due-date" and paid a $5 fine for it; it was fully worth it. While some may find the minutiae on the novel's influences and spin-offs too much detail, this was precisely what made the book relevant for me. Raised in a denomination - Seventh-day Adventist - that developed in the Northern, Protestant culture Stowe also lived in, her concerns and influences felt familiar. From the connections of the temperance movement to popular eschatology, to the connections of the women's movement to spiritualism, these were issues effecting the pioneers of Adventism.

In fact, the connection between Harriet Beecher Stowe and my own faith and culture are so strong that I originally intended to call this post something like Harriet Beecher Stowe, Ellen White, Fiction, Spiritualism, Feminism, and Me. I'm going to spare you the whole volume of navel gazing such a broad topic would invite, but still tell a little of my own relationship with Stowe's novel.

When I read UTC last year I had a specific purpose - to discover what was wrong with it. Not to discover what was wrong from an artistic stand-point, or to label its portrayal of blacks unacceptable from my liberal, (hopefully) resistant to stereotypes perspective. No, it was to discover what was wrong with the book spiritually; in fact, it was to be my experiment in examining conservative Adventists' views on novel reading. (They're against it.)

This is what Adventist founder, authoress, and prophetess, Ellen White, had to say about UTC:

There are many things in the work that would do no harm, and there are many things which have served a purpose in the exposure of slavery, but I would not want to recommend this book to our youth for their perusal. There are statements and pen-pictures which set the imagination upon a train of thought that has been deleterious and positively injurious. These highly-wrought pictures have taken hold of nervous, susceptible youth, and they have lived them over and over again in imagination. It has destroyed appetite for the Bible, and the desire to attend prayer-meetings; for everything was stale and without interest after feasting upon the diet found in this book.

As a young Adventist whose one form of "rebellion" has been my appetite for classic literature, I read the novel with eyes peeled for anything sensual, "highly-wrought", or otherwise suspect so that I could examine the above statement. I did, in fact, find some aspects that might fit with this description. First, there's the simple fact that Harriet Beecher Stowe was deeply attracted to the then-new and popular spiritualism movement and claimed, "I did not write that book... I only put down what I saw. It all came before me in visions, one after another, and I put them down in words.” The novel itself incorporates what Adventists consider a great error - the natural immortality of the soul.

There are several ways in which the novel might be considered "highly-wrought". The intersecting plots, especially the one dealing with the escape of the Harris family, are exciting, like the popular adventure novels of the day. We are even led just to the brink of sympathizing with violence (in self-defense) when George Harris shoots, but does not kill, slave-catcher Tom Loker. However, as Reynolds points out, Stowe does not actually condone violence in this novel, since "George Harris is relieved that Loker is not killed" and takes him to be nursed by the kindly Quakers.

Another feature that may have called forth White's objection (since it certainly did other reviewers' of the day) is the frank depiction of sexual slavery. Yet, as Reynolds again points out, “Stowe suggests [women's] sexual attractiveness without being tawdry.” The male gaze is present, but in loathsome characters, not ones the reader is to identify with, and sex acts occur “in a threatened future... in the past... or offstage...” While some characters are necessarily depicted as debased, we are led to sympathize with the oppressed (and pious) characters.

My own conclusion, especially after reading Reynolds' informative work, is that Stowe was able to refine elements of popular culture into a tool for righteousness. Her own concerns about the moral influences of literature and theater, coupled with her intelligence and deeply-personal faith, convince me that her work deserves respectful, though not-uncritical attention. Uncle Tom's Cabin helped launch the Civil War by appealing to the emotions and empathy of the public. Today, I try to read it critically and appreciate the context given by a book like Reynolds'. 

Yet, 161 years later, the emotional power of the novel still matters. It is still empathy that teaches us to acknowledge the rights of others, that bases (in Stowe's words) a "ladder to heaven in human affections." That's why, today this post is not merely about the questions about literature raised for me by the writings of Ellen White. It's also not merely about the things the novel - and especially its spin-off plays - got wrong in the area of racial stereotyping, even though talking about this matters. Instead, this post is about the power of literature to change hearts, start wars, and strike fear into the hearts of Equality's enemies (as evidenced by the free black man in the antebellum South sentenced to ten years in jail for owning a copy of UTC). This post is about the wonderful Harriet Beecher Stowe - a doubter, a believer, a wife, a mother, a sister, an author, an ally, an influence for a "great cause/God's new Messiah". This post is me saying that I can think critically about this novel in a variety of ways, and yet declare that I love it. It (and reading about the characters' real-life counterparts in Reynolds' book) has enlarged my sympathy for others and shown me a vision of Christ suffering in His people. This post is me declaring that all my questions aren't answered, and that's okay, because this novel did for me what it did for thousands 161 years ago - it made me think more critically, and it made me love more widely. Racism, sexual slavery, economic oppression and other evils addressed by Stowe still must be fought today, and therefore this novel still matters.

Feminism and Me

I've long considered writing a post on this subject, because it explains so much of who I am. Lately, spending more time in the Christian blogosphere than the literary one, I came across the opportunity to engage in the subject with other Christians. Enter FeminismsFest - an effort to get people (especially Christians, I gather) discussing what feminism means to them. And while my posts for FeminismsFest don't keep this strictly a book blog, yet, as with so much of my life, books and words gave birth to this part of me too. It's a long and complicated story, bear with me. I've tried to provide some structure by weaving the suggested questions into my story.

  What is your experience with feminism?

Growing up in a conservative Seventh-day Adventist Christian home, I didn't hear a lot about "feminism". (I certainly can't remember when I first encountered the idea or in what light.) My mom was a stay-at-home mom; my dad made the living. Girls were supposed to be ladylike; gender differences were marked. (Of course, I wasn't always ladylike - screaming out the window of the car and being rebuked, playing "the girls chase the boys" while my parents attended spiritual seminars.) Reserve and modesty, I was taught, surrounded a girl with a wall of protection. It wasn't stated, but it was implied, that bad girls brought bad things on themselves.

Yet I also read books about strong women and girls, like Florence Nightingale or Laura Ingalls Wilder. I remember reading about and admiring Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  In fiction I met Jo March and Anne Shirley, girls overflowing with ambition and autonomy.

Around age 13, under the influence of a uber-conservative 19 year-old friend, I eschewed pants in favor of long skirts and dresses. For a little while modesty was my hobbyhorse, and I was drifting in the direction of Christian patriarchy.

Continuing my story with the second question: What’s a story or a memory or a person that you associate with that word?

Though I didn't realize it then, the pivotal moment came at age 14 when I first listened to an unabridged audiobook of Jane Eyre. I was obsessed. I sat on the hardwood of my bedroom floor crying over the beauty of Rochester's words, "My bride is here, because my equal is here, and my likeness."

I don't mean that those words made me a feminist, though they resounded deep in my heart. Rather, it was my new obsession with the story that led me to pick up The Madwoman in the Attic. That book didn't make me a feminist either, but it gave me a new perspective and a new language on patriarchy and women's struggles with oppression through the ages. I had found the unifying story in the classic novels I was reading: the women's story.

 My "wordlly" interest in literature and film led me to become a fan of actress Emma Thompson. In her interviews, she talked about feminism a lot. Her work with the Helen Bamber Foundation opened my eyes to the horror of human trafficking. Her letter to herself at age 16 helped me, at that same age, to stop worrying about how others saw my body.

 Why does it have negative or positive connotations for you?

I was coming to accept the label "feminist" for myself, but my Christian culture still repelled it. A strong "mother in Israel" - a matriarch who wasn't afraid to rebuke men - once cautioned her granddaughter and me with the words, "You don't want to be women's libbers."

Why not? I asked myself. Didn't Jesus come to proclaim "liberty to the captives... [and] them that are bound"? (Isaiah 61:1)

The culture I was raised in would probably be described as complementarian, although the "as unto the Lord" clause of Ephesians 5 was emphasized. Beyond the proof texts offered by complementarians, historic Adventism's problem with the women's movement encompassed the free-love-advocating spiritualists, like Victoria Woodhull, who were prominent in the suffrage movement. 

Usually I don't find the above issue especially problematic. I believe I can consider myself a part of the women's movement without supporting everything done in its name, just as I don't support so much done in the name of Christianity. Yet some days it worries me a little and I want to distance myself from much of feminism, just as I want to distance myself from much of Christianity.

Frequently disturbing for me have been texts like Ephesians 5: 22-24. Sometimes I've been sure that I can't submit to a mortal man so fully, so will have to be perpetually single to maintain my Christian obedience. Lately, I've come to understand verse 22-24 as subordinate to verse 21.

Most days I'm pretty firmly on the side of women's ordination, although mentioning Korah, Dathan and Abiram may bring niggling doubts about questioning God's choices.

I still don't know how to deal with the Old Testament's patriarchal pronouncements on rape, virginity, and impurity. I admit that there's sometimes a conflict between the Old Testament and the feminist sensibilities I've developed. And then I remember that the all scripture testifies of Jesus - He who makes all one in Him. (Galatians 3:28) And, yes, I'm still confused. Some days I'm stronger in my feminist beliefs, some days in my Christian ones. I confess that I question and reexamine the bases for both.

How do you define the term, either academically or personally? What writers have you read whose definitions you want to bring out?

I can't think of a quick definition off the top of my head, other than one that has been attributed to various sources. I believe I first read in Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists: "Feminism is the radical notion that women are people."

My feminism has come a long way from my tentative first steps opening feminist literary criticism. I now understand the way "modesty" and "purity culture" contribute to ubiquitous rape culture. (More on that in another post.) I identify with many feminists as (generally) politically liberal. I recognize the intersectionality between gender, race, and feminism. I don't like abortion, but I get really angry about the way it's opposed by many Christians, Republicans and (let's face it) rich, white dudes.

I haven't actually read a lot of feminist books. More of my influences (especially in the last few months) have been from feminist bloggers, like thefemcritique on tumblr, and HerbsandHangs (especially dealing with rape and rape culture). Love, Joy, Feminism was especially interesting when I was reading, in fascinated horror, about the purity movement last year. I don't agree with everything on these blogs, but I think they give a good sample of secular feminist thought. I also have quite a bit of stuff on feminism on my own Tumblr blog.

Well, I must hie me to bed. I've only scratched the surface of my own relationship with feminism, but there's two more days to try to dig a little deeper. My hope is that, disjointed and shallow as these posts may be, they will help someone understand feminism a little better.

The only question left to be settled now is: Are women persons? And I hardly believe any of our opponents will have the hardihood to say they are not. Being persons, then, women are citizens; and no state has a right to make any law, or to enforce any old law, that shall abridge their privileges or immunities.

-- Susan B. Anthony