The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center is the site of the home of
the author of the influential anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom's
Cabin.
June 2001 - June 2002 marks the 150th anniversary of the
publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin. The Stowe Center is
commemorating this important event with programs to foster
dialogue on the critical issues raised in and by the book
and connect the legacy of Uncle Tom's Cabin and its themes
to current topics of concern. The varied programs will
include exhibits, performance, activities, the written word
and images.
These programs are intended to help people understand
Harriet Beecher Stowe's work in the context of her times,
her own personal experiences and her beliefs, and to inspire
people to work to make a difference in their communities.
We hope you will join us in this commemoration! For more
information, call 860-522-9258. Fore the latest program activites, plese see News.
|
"I wrote what I did because as a woman, as a mother, I was oppressed and broken-hearted with the sorrows and injustice I saw, because as a
Christian I felt the dishonor to Christianity -because as a lover of my country, I trembled at the coming day of wrath." Harriet Beecher Stowe -
when asked what made her write Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Harriet Beecher Stowe published more than 30 works, but it was her best-selling novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin or Life Among the Lowly, that brought her
international celebrity and lasting fame. Serialized in 1851 in the anti-slavery newspaper The National Era, and published in 1852, the book was an
immediate success. Within days 10,000 copies sold. By year's end worldwide sales reached nearly 1.5 million. Only the Bible sold as well.
Controversial when first published, Uncle Tom's Cabin remains controversial. Stowe's discussions of slavery and racism generated praise and
criticism from North and South, inspiring thousands to become abolitionists, but causing others to write "Anti-Tom's" defending slavery. Stowe, as
a woman of her time, reflected the racial biases of her day. Nevertheless, her contemporary, Frederick Douglass, the famous African-American
abolitionist, recognized the book as an important weapon against slavery. Later plays solidified the stereotypes in Uncle Tom's Cabin, causing
modern critics to blame Stowe for "the moral disgrace" of segregation. Called by one historian America's "first protest novel" Uncle Tom's Cabin
was never as simple as it seemed. It's still not.
* Langston Hughes 1952
|
Uncle Tom's Cabin opens on the Shelby plantation in Kentucky as two slaves, Tom and 4-year old Harry, are sold to pay Shelby family debts.
Developing two plot lines, the story focuses on Tom, a strong, religious, young man living with his wife and 3 children, and Eliza, Harry's mother.
When the novel begins, Eliza's husband George Harris, unaware of Harry's danger, has already escaped, planning to later purchase his family's
freedom. To protect her son, Eliza runs away, making a dramatic escape over the frozen Ohio River with Harry in her arms. Eventually the Harris
family is reunited and journeys north to Canada.
Tom protects his family by choosing not to run away so the others may stay together. Sold south, he meets Topsy, the young, black girl whose
mischievous behavior hides her pain; Eva, the angelic, young, white girl whose death moved Victorians to tears; charming, elegant St. Clare; and
finally, cruel, violent Simon Legree. Tom's deep faith gives him an inner strength that frustrates his enemies as he moves toward his fate in
Louisiana.
The novel ends when both Tom and Eliza escape slavery: Eliza and her family reach Canada; but Tom's freedom comes with death. Simon Legree, Tom's
third and final master, has Tom whipped to death for refusing to deny his faith or betray the hiding place of two runaway slave women.
The strength of Uncle Tom's Cabin is not the plot, but its ability to illustrate slavery's effect on families. Characters freely debated the causes
of slavery, the Fugitive Slave Law, the future of freed slaves, what an individual could do, and racism. Writing in the 1950s, African-American
poet Langston Hughes called the book a "moral battle cry for freedom."
Uncle Tom's Cabin struck a nerve in American society and found a permanent place in American culture. Pulitzer prize-winning author Jane Smiley
notes that literature should help us face responsibilities not avoid them. The strength of Uncle Tom's Cabin today, as in 1851, is its ability to
inspire readers to reach towards social justice.
- The Connecticut Humanities Council
- The Greater Hartford Arts Council
- The Connecticut Collaborations for Teaching the Arts and Humanities, a partnership of the Connecticut Humanities Council and the Eisenhower Program of the Connecticut Department of Higher Education
- The Louise Galvin Honorary Program Fund
- Carlos Hernández-Chávez' performance is partially supported by the Evelyn Preston Memorial Trust Fund.
Become a Member of the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center
|
