A little woman, a big fight.
-Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom's cabin abolition movement
18 1 1 year, Harriet Beecher Stowe was born in a pastor's home in litchfield, Connecticut, USA. She was influenced by theology since childhood and spent her whole life in a religious atmosphere. When she was a teenager, she received a good education in Hartford and especially liked reading. Besides studying theology, she also read a lot of works by Byron and Scott, two famous writers who had great influence on her later creation.
When Harriet Beecher Stowe was fourteen, his family moved to Boston, and a few years later moved to Cincinnati. In Cincinnati, her father Lyman Beecher was appointed dean of Ryan Theological Seminary. Harriet lived with her father in Cincinnati until 1850. Shortly after teaching in middle school, she met Calvin Stowe, a teacher at Lane Theological Seminary, got married and had six children. During this period, she occasionally wrote short articles and novels for magazines.
Cincinnati is located on the Ohio River in Kentucky, and the suburbs are dotted with large serf-owner plantations. At that time, it was one of the centers of the abolitionist movement in North America, and passionate speeches against slavery were often heard in urban areas. At the same time, Cincinnati is also a refuge for fugitive slaves all over the world. They took Cincinnati as a transit point through the "underground railway" and then fled to Canada or the northern free state.
Under the influence of the abolitionist movement, Mrs. Stowe's family also expressed deep sympathy for the slaves. Lieman Beecher's family has a fugitive slave, which gives Mrs. Stowe a chance to hear the fugitive slave tell her tragic experience and accuse her of the evil of slavery. Later, Mrs. Stowe got another chance to visit several plantations in Maysville, Kentucky with her friends. She heard and witnessed the misery of slaves' labor and life-this is the prototype of Shelby Plantation in Uncle Tom's Cabin. Mrs. Stowe's younger brother is a businessman who often travels between New Orleans and Honghe County. He told Mrs. Stowe many true stories about the cruelty and misery of southern slave owners, especially the misdeeds of a vicious slave owner he met on a merchant ship on the Mississippi River, which shocked Mrs. Stowe greatly. Later, on the basis of this person, Mrs Stowe successfully created the image of Legelli as a villain.
1850, Mr. Stowe was hired as a professor at Bowing College in Maine, and his family moved to northern New England. There, Mrs. Stowe gradually became a staunch abolitionist.
One day, Mrs. Stowe received a letter from her sister-in-law. In the letter, Mrs. Edward Beecher, her sister-in-law, asked her to write something to let the people of the whole country know what hateful slavery is like. At that time, Mrs. Stowe's family supported her and they were also active participants in the abolitionist movement. Her brother Edward gave an impassioned speech on the abolition of slavery in a church in Boston, and her other brother Henry Ward held a special auction of slaves in Brooklyn church to set them free. Therefore, Mrs. Stowe said that if she wanted to learn from her brother, she must write. She said, "God bless me. I want to write what I know. As long as I live, I will definitely write. "
A few days later, the first chapter of Uncle Tom's Cabin was finished. According to Mrs. Stowe's memory, once, when she was attending church in Wake Church, bruns, creative inspiration suddenly came to her mind, and Uncle Tom's experience gradually formed a complete story in her mind. In the afternoon, she went home, locked the door and began to read quickly. There was not enough manuscript paper, so she used food wrapping paper instead. After writing the first chapter, Mrs. Stowe read it to her husband and children. They were deeply moved. Mr. Stowe encouraged his wife to continue writing. He said, "If you keep writing like this, you can write a great book."
Then, Mrs. Stowe wrote a letter to her friend Gamal Bailey in Washington, telling her about her plan to write Uncle Tom's Cabin. Gammel Bailey is the editor of the National Times, an abolitionist publication in Washington. Gammel Bailey has been a close friend of the Stowe family since she received a philanthropist in Cincinnati. In a letter to her, Mrs. Stowe said: Uncle Tom's Cabin can be serialized in three or four issues in the New National Times. Gammel Bailey was so happy that she immediately replied to this letter and sent $300 as a date fee. Since June 185 1, Uncle Tom's Cabin has been published in this weekly magazine advocating the abolition of slavery. As a result, the situation was unexpected Mrs. Stowe writes longer and longer, and the characters, plots and dialogues in her works snowball. Uncle Tom's Cabin has been serialized in the National Times for nearly a year (more than forty issues). After the novel was serialized, Mrs. Stowe said, "This novel was written by God himself, and I am just a pen in her hand."
Although the circulation of the National Times is not large, Uncle Tom's Cabin has won thousands of enthusiastic readers. The following year, a small publishing house in Boston, John Earle Publishing Company, decided to publish the book. The first edition printed 5000 copies, sold 3000 copies on the first day, and sold out all the next day. Then reprinted, printed 10 thousand copies a week, and sold out. If you print more copies, eight American publishing houses will print 300 thousand copies day and night in a year, which still can't meet the needs of readers. At that time, almost every educated American rushed to read this "gripping" novel.
Before long, Uncle Tom's Cabin became famous abroad. First, a young editor of Putnam Publishing Company in the United States sent a copy to a British publisher. Within a year, 18 British publishing companies competed to print1500,000 copies, which were distributed to the British Isles and Commonwealth countries. European publishers took action immediately. In just a few years, the book was translated into 22 languages, including France, Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy, and its influence spread all over the world.
At the same time, Uncle Tom's Cabin was adapted into a script and put on the stage. Numerous theatrical troupes and dramas are staged all over the world. Mrs. Stowe disapproved of this situation, but she couldn't stop it.
The spread of Uncle Tom's Cabin made Mrs. Stowe a world-famous figure. She was invited to visit Europe three times. In England, she was received by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. She also met famous writers George Elliott, Dickens, Kingsley, Ruskin, Macaulay and Gladstone. The ordinary people in the British Isles and continental Europe warmly welcomed the abolitionist heroine from the "New World". In Edinburgh, people donated 1000 gold coins and asked Mrs. Stowe to take them back to the United States for the abolition of slavery in North America.
Of course, the praise of Uncle Tom's Cabin was mixed with scolding. The Southern Literature Newsletter, a propaganda mouthpiece representing the interests of southern slave owners, accused Mrs. Stowe of "distorting the facts" and the novel was "a reflection of illusion". At first, Uncle Tom's Cabin could be sold freely in the Southern Book Market, but it soon became a banned book, and anyone who owns this book would feel unsafe. In order to answer her criticism and slander, Mrs. Stowe wrote Notes on Uncle Tom's Cabin, and published the background materials, documents, anecdotes, conversation minutes and other contents about this book. This book consists of four parts. The first part is character description; The second part criticizes the slave escape law; The third part introduces some typical experiences of black slaves and points out the necessity of changing slavery in the South. The last part is the criticism of the separatist position of the church. The notes in Uncle Tom's Cabin didn't cause much response. An English publisher who once made a fortune by printing Uncle Tom's Cabin forgot profit and righteousness, stole 50,000 notebooks, dreamed of making another windfall, and finally went bankrupt because of poor sales.
1856, Mrs. Stowe published The Story of the Dark Wasteland. A total of100000 copies were sold around, but in the end they failed to reach the record of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Mrs. Stowe is a diligent and prolific writer. During her thirty years of hard work, she published a book almost every year. In addition, she wrote many stories, essays, comments and so on. Mrs. Stowe died on 1896 at the age of 85.
Uncle Tom's Cabin has a profound impact on social development, especially on the American abolitionist movement and the Civil War. 1862, President Lincoln met Mrs. Stowe at the White House and praised her for "this little woman wrote a book that started a big war". The famous writer Charles Sumner said? "Without Mrs. Stowe's uncle Tom's cabin, abraham lincoln would not have been elected president of the United States."
Kirk Monroe said when talking about Mrs. Stowe's historical position: "She is not only outstanding among world-famous women, but also more influential than anyone at the most critical historical moment that determines the fate of the American people. ..... Of course, the abolition of slavery is not and cannot be accomplished by one person. It is the cause of everything, but Uncle Tom's Cabin has the greatest and far-reaching influence. "
There is no doubt about the literary significance of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Van wyck brooks said: "Aside from the atmosphere of novel writing, Uncle Tom's Cabin is a great folk biography reflecting an era and a country." The famous poet henry wadsworth longfellow called this book "the greatest victory in the history of literature".
A long time later, Mrs. Stowe's son and grandson said "Uncle Tom's Cabin" in poetic language: "Like a blazing fire, it lit up the horizon; Just like a surging wave of emotions swept away everything in front of us, and then crossed the vast sea, the impact will spread all over the world. The whole world is thinking and talking about it. "
Uncle Tom's Cabin not only describes slaves with different performances and personalities, but also describes the faces of different types of slave owners. It focuses on the story of Tom, a slave who accepted the Christian spirit instilled by slave owners and resigned himself. They also created rebellious slaves, such as Eliza and her husband george harris, who were unwilling to let the slave owners decide their own lives and deaths. At the same time, it also reveals that the inner world of various slave owners is not exactly the same as that of slave owners. Through the description of Tom and george harris, two slaves with different personalities, this book tells readers that Tom, who was resigned to the fate of slave owners, could not escape the fate of death, while George and his wife, who dared to resist and fight, were reborn. Therefore, Uncle Tom's Cabin has played a positive role in social development, especially in the victory of the American abolitionist movement and the just side represented by Lincoln in the American Civil War. As a literary work, the famous American poet henry longfellow called it "the greatest victory in the history of literature".