Egalitarianism in Twelve Years a Slave:

The Abduction of Free Citizens and the Boundaries of Slavery

Abstract

Solomon Northup's Twelve Years a Slave (1853）is a slave narrative dictated by a black man who was born in the North as a free citizen but was abducted and held in slavery in the South for twelve years. Although today it is less well known than other narratives, its uniqueness within its genre is worth noting because Northup's voice and theme are different from those of the authors who were born into slavery. While former slave authors wrote their narratives as autobiographies, expressing their anger and frustration toward slavery and their own destiny, Northup's narrative, written from a Northern citizen's viewpoint, rather focused on what Southern slavery really was in a calm and restrained voice. His seemingly ＂white＂ voice is derived from his privileged background and his close connections with white people. Despite all those years he spent as a slave, and despite the fact that he had been defrauded and sold into slavery by white kidnappers, Northup never lost faith in humanity. In the process of enslavement, he was carried beyond various boundaries against his will: crossing a geographical boundary turned him into a chattel; legal boundaries deprived him of his civil rights including the right to benefit from his own labor; and the mental boundary of proslavery people's racial inferiority theory denied Northup's intelligence. After his rescue, however, Northup demonstrated in his narrative how these white-defined boundaries were arbitrary and groundless. Defining himself as a ＂free citizen＂ of New York, he demanded that all members of society be treated fairly regardless of race or color. Northup's outward ＂white＂ viewpoint was based on his egalitarian values, and his restrained and objective voice in his factual narrative shows his longing for racial tolerance, with which he wanted his narrative to go beyond boundaries of race and color.