12 Years a Slave (A book review)

Title: 12 Years a Slave

Author: Solomon Northup

Note: All efforts have been made to keep this review short and spoiler-free. However, there are some spoilers because analysis does require some factual substantiation.  I shall try and avoid adding too many facts. The point here is to provide an analysis. This is not a gateway for potential bluffing by lazy potatoes who would rather not read those 227 pages.

This memoir, if it is read thoroughly, will present a number of sociological and ethical issues that many would rather not address. It is both an observation and an indictment of the arbitrary intra-species dehumanisation that is sociologically indoctrinated into both the dehumaniser as well as the dehumanised.

The arbitrary discrimination based on race is of course, pervasive. This racism is not only demonstrated by the slave owners in the South but, even by the more 'enlightened' men of the North. The discrimination by the latter is displayed by two lines in the book, on page 209,i.e., when the evidence of the protagonist is made inadmissible in court because he was a coloured man. Clearly, some are equal, and some are even more equal.

Within the realm of severe objectification and dehumanisation, what is chilling is the enormous degrees of malleability and adaptation that the human psyche is capable of. Within 12 years the protagonist adapted from being a free man with a family and an independent livelihood to a life that was diametrically the opposite, i.e., to being traded, owned and being bereft of any liberty.  An extrapolation of this ability of slaves to adapt to inhuman conditions may explain the existence, the acceptance, as well as, the survival of many within excruciating conditions.

Most ethical and sociological perversities are captured within the arc of the caucasians treating the african-americans as sub humans, i.e., mere property. Interestingly, the implications of the purely contractual treatment of the african americans may be an ominous foreboding towards, in contemporary times, the endeavours for a purely contractual approach towards surrogacy (especially when the surrogate is from a third world country). If this book is any indicator of how exploitative and oppressive contractual relations involving human beings may become, then it is important that surrogacy is carefully regulated and addressed keeping in mind the aspects of humanity and equality. 

Another interesting aspect of this book is the interplay between law and society and the age old argument(s) of which may influence the other. While slavery had been abolished in the North, it did not deter the abduction of the protagonist nor Burch, the slave trader, from trading the protagonist. However, towards the end of the novel, human agency attempted to rectify the insouciance of its brethren by retrieving the protagonist from his forced slavery. Thus, this is an illustration of how the the law is only in letter until society decides to uphold it. At the same time, it may also be duly observed that in the absence of the  - albeit - dithering letter of the law, salvation all together would have been impossible for the protagonist. 

While my reading base on the issue of slavery is meagre (to put it politely), it definitely sheds light on the sensitivity of african americans on various issues. If this book has even an iota of accuracy on their treatment (that too when slavery was allegedly somewhat abolished) then they definitely have a right to be vociferous. In the words of the author himself:

Men may write fictions portraying  lowly life as it is, or as it is not - may expatiate with owlish gravity upon the bliss of ignorance - discourse flippantly from arm chairs of the pleasures of slave life; but let them toil with him in the field - sleep with him in the cabin - feed with him on husks; let them behold him scourged, hunted, trampled on, and they will come back with another story in their mouths [Northup, 1853:131] 

This book is a reminder of the importance of the necessity upholding intra-species dignity and it should be read alteast once. Furthermore, 'no',  I have not seen the movie.