“How could I adopt Northup’s technique of using contrasts?”

Introduction

In this essay, I will be discussing and answering the essay question above, which asks the question”How could I adopt Northup’s technique of using contrasts?”

Main Body

In Solomon Northup’s’ famous autobiography, Up from Slavery, he uses several contrasts to make various different points. As a kidnapped slave he witnessed slavery in its true form, which was a evil and corrupt system that destroyed the lives of thousands of black African-Americans.

Perhaps the largest contrast that Northup makes in his autobiography, the difference between a kind master and an evil one. When Northup was first introduced to slavery on a plantation, he was actually bought by a kind master who did not treat his slaves badly.

In contrast, Northup’s next few masters are inhumanly brutal, whipping their slaves for the tiniest infractions and generally misusing their slaves. Northup contrasts the ‘good’ master and the evil master very well, making it obvious to the reader how greatly these two types of master differed.

I have a feeling that Northup’s contrast technique is not that hard to adopt. I think his technique basically consists of using very good writing skills to describe two different situations and then contrast them. Using the earlier example of the masters, Northup describes the horror of serving under a bad master in such gruesome detail that the reader is shocked. Then Northup also describes the good master, who is still the master of the slaves, but treats them much better than the evil master does.

When those two are contrasted together, using Northup’s excellent literary abilities make a striking juxtaposition. I think probably the two key to contrasting like Northup, is to write your two contrasting situations in a way that grips the reader to the point where they can very clearly see a contrast. Being able to describe something well is a tricky literary skill but if you master it, you can convince your readers much easier.

Conclusions

To summarise the essay, this essay was about how I could adopt Northup’s technique of using contrasts and what that looked like in Northup’s autobiography. Northup uses strong contrasts in his autobiography to expose slavery as the evil system it is. His technique consists of using literary tools and two good scenarios to contrast them together in a way that grabs the attention of the reader.

Introduction

In this essay I will be discussing and answeribng the essay question above, which states as follows, “Describe the differences between Northup’s response to separation from his children and Eliza’s response to separation from her children

Main body

The essay question that I have to answer, is posed in the context of both parent-child seperations that happened

Northup

In the story, Northup describes how he, a freeman living in the north, was kidnapped and sold into slavery down south. At the point of his kidnapping, he had been married and had three children, from whom he was deceitfully separated. When Northup realises the situation he is in, the book describes his anguish and hurt from being separated from his family, yet he still had hope that, someday, he would escape.

Eliza

In the story, Northup describes how Eliza, a slave mother to two children, was sold to the same slave trader who had acquired Northup. When she was sold to a plantation master, the trader would not allow her children to go with her and thus the family was tragically separated. In the book, it is only by force that she can be separated and her anguish is very clear in the text. Eliza never recovers from this separation and falls into a steady decline of health till she dies later in the book.

The difference between these two separations is not too large, yet there are a few distinctions between them. Firstly, as a mother, Eliza had extremely strong maternal bonds to her children, which Northup did not have, as he was a father. I’m not saying Northup did not love his children, he did, but studies have shown that mothers have a particularly special bond with their children, which renders separation a lot more painful.

Secondly, the setting. Northup knew, or was at least mostly hopeful, that his children and wife were safe from slavery and that it was just him being sold. Eliza on the other hand, knew her children would be sold into slavery as well and there was nothing she could do about it. Her helplessness in the future for her children made the situation darker and more hopeless.

Conclusion

To summarise and conclude, the essay discussed and answered the question regarding Northup and Eliza, two slaves who were separated from their children and how each individual reacted differently to the other. I concluded that, while both parents felt pain and anguish at separation, Eliza’s maternal instinct made her separation from her children especially hard to take. The setting of the situation also played a key role, as Northup’s children were safe from slavery, while Eliza’s children were being sold into slavery.

Introduction

In this essay, I will be discussing and answering the essay question above, which states: What was Thompson’s theory of the relationship between sanctions and slavery?

Background

John Thompson was a slave who worked on several plantations in the south of the United States of America. He and many other thousands of black slaves, were victims of the horrible slave system that was very dominant in the southern states of America. Though Thompson did eventually escape from slavery, his memories of the practice were then compiled into an autobiography, so that more people could understand the evils of slavery.

Main Body

Throughout the autobiography, Thompson describes the evils and brutality of some parts of the slave system, which clearly tells the reader that he hated the slave system. Yet, there is also a very interesting thread in the story that explains how, in some cases, slavery was more manageable.

This topic, though not formally stated in the autobiography, is the relationship between sanctions and slavery. This is revealed when Thompson describes the different slave owners he had to work under. Most of them were horrible monsters who treated their slaves very badly, using brute force to make them work. On the other hand, there were a select few slave owners who were kinder to their slaves.

Thompson points out that the slaves who worked for kinder masters, were more willing to work harder, whereas those with evil masters worked out of fear of their owners. This raises the important question, why use brutality when kindness will do the job just as well? The answer is that, no matter what types of people the masters of slaves where, they would always be tempted to misuse their power on the slaves.

Some masters chose to be more mild towards their slaves, whereas others misused their power because they could and even took enjoyment from it. Thompson understood this and pointed out that the slaves who worked for kinder masters usually worked harder than those of brutal masters.

Conclusion

To summarise and conclude the paper, this essay discussed and answered the essay question regarding Thompson’s theory of sanctions and slavery in his autobiography. My conclusion was, that Thompson’s theory was that instituting less harsh sanctions for slaves made them work harder. On the other hand, harsh sanctions just made the slaves work out of fear and subjected them to their masters’ brutalities.
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Introduction

In this essay, we will be answering the essay question, “What would I do in my autobiography that is different from what Darwin did?” Before I answer the question though, let me give a brief summary of the positive and negative aspects of Darwin’s autobiography.

Main Body

Charles Darwin’s autobiography is made up of a few stages of his life. He first writes about his childhood and education, then moving on to his voyage on the Beagle in which he travelled on the seas, gathering scientific information on islands, plants and animals. The last stage of his autobiography is his return and how he started to write about his discoveries.

One positive aspect of Darwin’s autobiography was his ability to describe key people in his life. In fact, he spends more time describing his friends than his actual voyage on the Beagle. But this actually leads into my next point, one I did not really like about the autobiography.

In my opinion, the biggest issue with Darwin’s autobiography, is the lack of important events and of a coherently thought out storyline. By this I mean that the autobiography does not include enough important information about his life. For example, he hardly mentions the book that changed the west, The Origin of Species and he also does not describe his voyage in enough detail.

So, how would I write my autobiography differently, given the infromation from Darwin’s story? Well, to begin, I think that his book encourages me to think harder about what I would include in my autobiography, if I ever wrote one. I think I would try and fix the issues I mentioned avbove by planning out the autobiography in great detail.

As we have already seen, having a good and coherent story line is key. Another way to improve your autobiography is to include the important events in your life. This helps to form a stronger connection with the reader, as everyone has at least one important event happen during their life.
These are all good things to look out for when writing an autobiography.

Conclusion

To summarise and conclude, this essay discussed and answered the essay question regarding Charles Darwin and his autobiography and how I would do things differently in my autobiography. The lack of description of some important events during Darwin’s life in his autobiography, prompt me to think about how I should structure and write my own autobiography.

Introduction

In this essay I will be discussing and answering the essay question, “Should I include reconstructed speeches in my autobiography?”

Main Body

To start, let me explain what a reconstructed speech is. A reconstructed speech is a dialogue that has been recorded exactly so you can write what you actually said. Usually reconstructed speeches are put into autobiographies for special moments that need remembering, or just for pivotal moments in the authors’ life.

Now that we know what a reconstructed speech is, let us dive into the actual essay. If I were ever going to write an autobiography, would I include reconstructed speech in it? I think that it depends greatly on the circumstances. Firstly, I must note that writing accurate speech is very very difficult, because for it to be reconstructed speech you need to have very accurate information.

Not only is reconstructed speech very hard to get right, you also have to be careful with the amounts of it that you put into your autobiography. By this I mean that having too much reconstructed speech can pull your readers away from the main story and confuse them.

So while reconstructed speech is definitely a very valuable asset that you can integrate into your writing, there are a couple of things you must look out for. If I were to write an autobiography, I would try to make sure that my placement of reconstructed speech would only be in places where it would flow well with the overall story.

Conclusion

To summarise, this essay discussed and answered the question regarding reconstructed speeches and wether I should include them in my autobiography when I write one. The positives of having reconstructed speech, are that it can make your autobiography even more realistic and valuable, given you place it in the right area. The negatives of reconstructed speech are that it is hard to find and that an overdose of it can spoil parts of your autobiography for the reader.
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If I were ever going to write an autobiography, who would be my target audience? This is a very important part of any book, as having a specific group of people in mind while writing can be very helpful for the end draft.

My target audience would preferably be a younger generation that, when reading my book, could learn about what happened during my life. They could also find the large events that happened during my life and hear about them from my point of view at that time.

I hope you enjoyed this short essay!

Introduction

In this essay I will be looking at and answering the essay question above, which reads “What benefits would I get from writing an autobiography?” This question is taken from the 9th Grade RPC English course.

Main Body

To begin, let me define what an autobiography is. A autobiography is a story of your life, written by yourself. You can include what you want in your autobiography, but most of the time autobiographies are plainly accounts of the lives of the authors. So, how can I benefit from writing one?

In my opinion, having an account of my life that I could look back on, would be a great way for me to see how my life developed and how many things shaped me and also how God was working throughout my life.
It is also important to note that future generations might still be reading your autobiography, even after you have passed away. If I were going to write an autobiography, I would definitely consider writing it in a way that could benefit future generations.

Another benefit of an autobiography, is that you can pass it down through family, so that your children or grandchildren could have the opportunity to read about your life first-hand.
Those are all the things I could think of, though I am still not sure whether or not I should write an autobiography, lets wait and see how my life turns out!

Conclusion

To summarise and conclude the essay, we discussed and answered the essay question regarding how I would benefit from writing an autobiography. Firstly we discussed what an autobiography is, then moving on to a few ways that I could benefit from writing one. The first of these was, that writing an autobiography would give me a source from which I could read and remember what happened during my life. I also said that future generations might read my autobiography and that maybe even my future kids and grandkids could benefit from having the opportunity to read about my life.

Introduction

In this essay I will be discussing and answering the essay question, which states: “What can you do now to make your biography less disjointed than Twain’s?” This question is taken from the RPC 9th Grade English course

Main body

To begin, let me outline the ways in which Twain’s autobiography is disjointed. Firstly, throughout his story, you see that Mark Twain misses out large events that happened in his time and replaces them with small, uninteresting stories and events. Although writing an autobiography is entirely up to the writer, problems such as these can make it harder for the reader to follow and enjoy the story.

Linked to the first problem with his autobiography, I have also found that the consistency of the story is not very good. By this I mean that the sequence of chapters do not always fit into an understandable trail. Again, this is entireley up to the writer and there are many aspects that I enjoy about this autobiography too, but there are definitely also some parts to Twain’s storyline that I find harder to understand.

Now, how would I fix these issues in my autobiography? Firstly, I think I would try to structure my autobiography as a close-fitting story line. By this I mean that I would try to write the chapters in a way that can be clearly seen as a sequence. Secondly, I think that integrating large events that happened during my life will allow the reader to relate more to the story.

I also think that giving an account of the events that changed my life or beliefs is also very important. Though Mark Twain definitely did this in his autobiography, I feel that somehow he did not do it enough.

Conclusion

To summarise and conclude, this essay discussed and answered the question regarding Mark Twain’s autobiography and how I can make my autobiography less disjointed than his. In my opinion, Mark Twain’s autobiography did not flow very well and was in some parts quite disjointed. While this is not necessarily a very bad thing, it might confuse the reader and put them off when reading the story. To fix this problem, making your autobiography less disjointed is not too hard. Creating a well-structured storyline should probably eliminate this problem altogether.

Introduction

In this essay I will be looking at and answering the essay question which is, why I think Plunkitt was so open about how he made his money. This question is taken from the autobiography of George Washington Plunkitt.
Main body

George Washington Plunkitt was a New York politician who lived in the early nineteen hundreds. As a politician he was elected leader of the 17th district several times. In later life, he allowed somebody called William R. Riordan to write an Autobiography for him. At the beginning of the Autobiography, Plunkitt reveals how he made his money. This was done through what he called honest graft. But why was this put in the Autobiography?
I think there are two possible answers to this question.

Firstly, Plunkitt may have revealed the way he made money to escape accusations of sabotage and robbery. While ‘honest graft’ was still not completely legal, it was still better than outright stealing taxes from the people. So maybe, in a cunning and unobtrusive way, Plunkitt was trying to direct scandalous gossip away from himself?

The second solution, which is actually much more probable than the first, comes down to the writer of the autobiography. Though Plunkitt gave Riordan permission to write the autobiography, Riordan may not have been that trustworthy. Throughout the autobiography there are scenarios where Plunkitt exposes himself to his enemies in almost an unreal way. Why would he want his enemies to know something that could be used against him?

It seems bizarre, until you realise that Riordan may have had something to do with this. Plunkitt had been counting on the fact that future generations would read the book, not his enemies in politics.

Conclusion

To summarise and conclude, this essay was about how Plunkitt made his money and why he was so open about it. The answer to this question comes in two parts, with the first being that maybe Plunkitt wanted people to understand how he made money, so they could not accuse him of theft. The second reason is that William Riordan, the writer of the autobiography, wanted to expose Plunkitt to his enemies, knowing that many thought he was already a dishonest man.

Introduction

In this essay I will be looking at and answering the essay question above, which is derived from the biography of George W. Plunkitt as part of the 9th grade English RPC course.
Brief Overview
Before we begin answering the essay question, here is a brief overview of who George Washington Plunkitt was and what he did.

George Washington Plunkitt was a New York statesman and politician who lived from 1842 to 1924. He was also a leader of the Tammany Hall political association and interchangeably leader of the 17th and 11th districts of New York. After 1904, his political career ended and he died later in 1924.
Main body

So, moving back to the essay question, let me outline what exactly the question is talking about. Plunkitt was a cunning politician and he knew how to get support for election day. But throughout the autobiography, he has one large enemy, the Civil Service. Plunkitt hated the Civil Service, because it restricted many things in the area of politics, including jobs. This is where the essay question comes into play.

In Plunkitt’s day, the Civil Service was basically an organisation that was set up to make jobs in Politics harder to acquire. To get into Politics, you had to pass a Civil Service exam, in which the questions were very sophisticated and complicated. This meant that only intellectual young men who had educational knowledge could pass these examinations, therefore making the men who did pass, part of the elite and well-mannered politicians. This is what Plunkitt hated about Civil Service. Plunkitt was more concerned about practical knowledge, not college-level academic head knowledge.

Plunkitt saw this as a wasted opportunity, as many of the young, patriotic men would definitely have been suited for political jobs, but they were turned down because of the Civil Service. In the autobiography, Plunkitt also associates the Civil Service exams with the lack of patriotism found in men who had failed. He thought that failing these exams just because you could not answer a specific question was ridiculous.

Plunkitt claimed that these exams destroyed patriotism in young men who failed to pass. Plunkitt backed his claim up by presenting a couple of stories of young men who sank in depression after failing, which subsequently led them to not being patriotic anymore.
All in all, this goes to show that Plunkitt really despised the Civil Service for not handing out more jobs.

Conclusion
To summarise and conclude, this essay discussed and answered the essay question regarding Plunkitt and what he thought of patriotisms’ connection to obtaining a job after an election. My conclusion was that the Civil Service prevented young patriotic men from getting more jobs and also destroyed their patriotic passion.