The Story Of Mattie J. Jackson - 1152 Words

Mattie J. Jackson was born a slave in 1843 in St. Louis, Missouri. Her narrative was a book called â€Å"The Story of Mattie J. Jackson; Her Parentage—Experience of Eighteen Years in Slavery—Incidents During the War—Her escape from slavery. A True Story.† Similarly, like most slave narratives, it exemplifies the hardships of slavery up until to her freedom. Mattie’s narrative is a somewhat true depiction of a slave narrative because it is spoken through her mouth throughout the entire book except part of the preface. This is because the co-author is her stepfather’s wife; Dr. L.S. Thompson, who is black as well, and according to the â€Å"How to Read a Slave Narrative† article by the National Humanities Center most slave narratives were prefaced by a white person and rarely by a person of African descent (Andrews). According the narrative’s preface, she explains that her main goal for her book is to gain sympathy from people; ot hers like herself, who were bound against their will by a dominant race; white slave owners (Jackson 2). Mattie’s other goal is to raise money from the profits of her book in order to have a greater education. Thus, she encourages people to learn to be literate as it benefits them greatly. The harsh treatment and unjust practices of slavery reaffirms the values of abolitionists, but the character of her mother goes against the racial stereotypes of slaves. Despite the slave narrative being about her, the narrative demonstrates an unusually specific story of her