Incidents

While reading Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, it strikes me on how Jacobs centers a lot of the context on other people rather than her own life. In particular is her grandmother. In fact most of chapter seven is on her grandmother. But despite focusing on other people, she easily brushes over some events where one would expect there to be more emotion whether it be heartache or joy. For example, when she tells about the death of her father, it is written, "Dead? How could I believe it?"(Jacobs 8). and "My heart rebelled against God who had taken from me a mother, father, mistress and friend"(8). However, other than this, there is little more directly written on her feelings. Instead, one has to read in between the lines to find the full meaning. When Benjamin is leaving, she does try to convince him not to leave but all her reasons are over all the bad things that could happen due to him trying to escape. The reasons that are written out are reasons out of fear but searching further down, you can see that she has lost many family and close people. She must be scared.

Timmii