Thesis Michiel Vanhauwaert 20051832

Ghent University Faculty of Arts and Philosophy The Importance of the Mississippi River within the Anglo-Saxon and African-American Narratives in American Literature: Crossing or Following the River Supervisor: MICHIEL VANHAUWAERT Dr. Ilka Saal Master in Language and Literature: English English Literature Dpt. MA dissertation 2008-2009 2 Table of Contents Acknowledgements .............................................................................................................................. 3 0 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 4 I. NINETEENTH -CENTURY NARRATIVES ......................................................................................... 7 1 The Anglo-Saxon Narrative......................................................................................................... 7 1.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 7 1.2 The Conquest of the West Beyond the Mississippi River ................................................ 9 1.2.1 Frederick Jackson Turner and the American Frontier .............................................. 10 1.2.2 Crossing the Mississippi River ...................................................................................... 12 1.2.3 “Manifest Destiny”: the Justification and Inevitability of American Imperialism . 13 1.3 Mark Twain (1835-1910) ................................................................................................... 16 1.3.1 Life on the Mississippi ..................................................................................................... 19 1.3.2 Adventures of Huckleberry Finn .................................................................................... 27 2 The African-American Narrative ............................................................................................. 37 2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 37 2.2 Slavery .................................................................................................................................. 40 2.3 Captivity versus Liberty: the Slaves’ Plight Exemplified in American Literature ....... 44 2.4 Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ........................................................................................ 50 II. TWENTIETH -CENTURY NARRATIVES ......................................................................................... 54 1 Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 54 2 Jonathan Raban: Old Glory ........................................................................................................ 55 2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 55 2.2 A Heroic Past versus Small-town America ...................................................................... 56 2.3 The Mississippi River and Gender .................................................................................... 59 2.4 Old Glory and Race ............................................................................................................. 60 3 O Brother, Where Art Thou? ...................................................................................................... 64 4 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 66 Works Cited...........................................................................................................................................70 3 Acknowledgements This Master dissertation is dedicated to Arne Willems, a good friend of mine who did not live to this day to see the result of a year’s intense work. His support during our last university year has meant a lot to me, and I am sure he would be the first to proofread and comment on my thesis enthusiastically, but unfortunately he will never have a chance to do so. In addition, I appreciate the effort of the English literature department, my promoter, the other two readers and the student administration to postpone the submission deadline. I would like to express my gratitude to my parents, friends and fellow students for the support they gave me when I had difficulties in working on this dissertation. Also thanks to my mother, Carine Maeckelberghe, for reading and commenting on my work. But the biggest word of thanks is of course extended to my promoter, Dr. Ilka Saal, for the endless amount of good advice, interesting ideas, constructive criticism and revisory work. Without her help and supervision, I would never have been able to complete what I have achieved now. It was a pleasure to work together with her. 17 August 2009 4 0 Introduction It is said that a title should be both concise and revealing. However, I think that the title of my master dissertation reveals everything and nothing. The key words of the title refer to the various aspects that I will discuss, but I assume that some explanation is called for. In total, I will work with three main dichotomies which are intertwined. The first division is thematic in nature: it opposes two large ‘narratives’ that I have called the Anglo-Saxon narrative and the African-American narrative. The second division is temporally oriented: how are these two narratives proportioned in the nineteenth century and in the twentieth century? A third division is a spatial category: an East-West movement is typically associated with the Anglo-Saxon narrative and a North-South movement along the Mississippi River is associated with the African-American narrative. The Anglo-Saxon narrative is the story of the white, Anglo-Saxon settlers who consi- dered the New World as their property. They imposed the Western civilization upon the Na- tive Americans, and they finally chased away the French and Spanish colonists as well. The African-American narrative, on the other hand, is the painful story of the blacks who were already imported in the seventeenth century and enslaved in the Americas. The crucial century, though, turned out to be the nineteenth century, in which the two narratives heavily competed against each other. The abolition of slave trade, the Civil War and finally the abolition of slavery are important milestones in America’s history, but the Anglo-Saxon narrative nevertheless seems the most dominant force in the nineteenth century. The Mississippi River is important and useful in that it stands as a physical and psy- chological symbol for both narratives. In the Anglo-Saxon narrative, the river is a natural boundary that had to be crossed in the conquest of the West. Therefore, the typical movement that I associate with this narrative is from East to West (and not back again). In the African- American narrative, the Mississippi is a symbol for slavery – the plantations, slave and cotton transport, being sold down river… Slavery ‘follows’ the course of the mighty river, from North to South, but here, a South-North movement is also found, for example when slaves escaped 5 towards the free states and Canada. So, the Mississippi River is significant for the two large narratives and it plays a prominent role in various literary works of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as well as in several songs and films: “the river’s unique contribution to the history and literature of the United States has woven it like a bright thread through the folk- lore and national consciousness of North America” (“Mississippi River” (2009)). Having now explained the title and the major terms and concepts that I will use throughout my dissertation, I will provide a brief overview of what I am going to discuss. As you will see in the table of contents, the first main division is between the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries. The two chief nineteenth-century narratives are first discussed indivi- dually, and in the twentieth-century section I will examine what has happened to these two narratives, and to what extent the one or the other has gained or lost prominence in compa- rison with the other. In the Anglo-Saxon narrative, I will first take a closer look at the conquest of the West beyond the Mississippi River. Frederick Jackson Turner’s The Frontier in American History (1920) is crucial in my analysis of frontier life, westward expansion and manifest destiny. The Americans asserted their feeling of superiority for the first time during several disputes and battles with the Native Americans. The ideals of the Old West and the heroic narrative of the American dream include progress, freedom (that is, only for whites), and the pursuit of indi- vidual happiness. In the works of Mark Twain, one of the most influential nineteenth-century writers in America, the contradicting ideals of frontier life/freedom/nostalgia for a lost past versus expansion/progress/civilization are developed in Life on the Mississippi (1883) and Ad- ventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884). The first one is both an autobiographic account of river life before and after the Civil War and a celebration of antebellum steamboat piloting. The second one is a novel in which the two narratives are ingeniously interlaced – therefore I have chosen to split up the discussion and divide it into two

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