Frederick Douglas Case

Douglas does not illustrate this childlike love and affection and connection with his grandmother in his Narrative as he does in My Bondage and My Freedom. In his first autobiography The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas, Douglas tells of the process of slave children being separated from their mother and placed under the care of an "old woman," "Frequently before the child has reached its twelfth month, its mother is taken from it, and hired out on some farm a considerable distance off, and the child is placed under the care of an old woman, too old for field labor (Narrative 1,2)." Douglas does not give a personal account or speak of his connection towards his grandmother in his Narrative as he did in My Bondage and My Freedom. "I had always lived with my grandma on the outskirts of the plantation, where she was put to raise the young children of the younger women. I had therefore been, until now, out of the way of the bloody scenes that often occurred on the plantation." Douglas kept his childhood brief in his Narrative so it was unclear of what slave childhood was like or if there were a childhood for slave children.

In Both autobiographies Douglas appeals to the reader through the usage of Pathos. Although Douglas takes a different route in both books his primary way of connecting to the reader is through emotion. In the first chapter of his Narrative Douglas makes his reader instantly hate slavery by painting a picture of all the gruesome and negative events taken place in the primary stage in his life. He told of the rumor of his master possibly being his father (Narrative 2, 3) which he did not mention in My Bondage and My Freedom. Moreover, Douglas speaks of his witnessing of his Aunt Hester being brutally beaten (Narrative 5, 6) which he does not mention in My Bondage and My Freedom. In telling these jaw trenching stories, Douglas has the reader hooked emotionally. For example, "It was the blood-stained gate, the entrance to the hell of slavery, through which I was about to pass. It was a most terrible spectacle. I wish I could commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld it (Narrative 5).

In My Bondage and My Freedom Douglas also connects to the reader through the usage of Pathos. However, instead of arousing hatred and hard feelings from the reader he brings out softer mellow emotions from the reader. In fact, Douglas does so in a poetic way at many times. For example, "But