About: William Earle, Jr. Obi; or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack (1800 novella)

Description
Metadata
Settings
- owl:sameAs
- Inference Rule:

About: William Earle, Jr. Obi; or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack (1800 novella) Sponge Permalink

An Entity of Type : owl:Thing, within Data Space : 134.155.108.49:8890 associated with source dataset(s)

One notable aspect of Obi or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack is its overt abolitionist leanings. Because historical information about Three-Fingered Jack was so scarce, the story was susceptible to manipulation from both ends of the political spectrum, and was often used to both support and indict the British slave trade. While many accounts of Three-Fingered Jack depict him merely as a terrorist or boogeyman, including a melodrama by William Murray and a pantomime by John Fawcett, Earle’s treatment explicitly presents him as “a bold and daring defender of the Rights of Man” and “as great a man as ever graced the annals of history” (68, 157). In order to gain his readers sympathy, Earle invests considerable effort into depicting the horrors of the slave trade and the immoral transgress

Attributes	Values
rdfs:label	William Earle, Jr. Obi; or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack (1800 novella)
rdfs:comment	One notable aspect of Obi or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack is its overt abolitionist leanings. Because historical information about Three-Fingered Jack was so scarce, the story was susceptible to manipulation from both ends of the political spectrum, and was often used to both support and indict the British slave trade. While many accounts of Three-Fingered Jack depict him merely as a terrorist or boogeyman, including a melodrama by William Murray and a pantomime by John Fawcett, Earle’s treatment explicitly presents him as “a bold and daring defender of the Rights of Man” and “as great a man as ever graced the annals of history” (68, 157). In order to gain his readers sympathy, Earle invests considerable effort into depicting the horrors of the slave trade and the immoral transgress
dcterms:subject	Books
abstract	One notable aspect of Obi or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack is its overt abolitionist leanings. Because historical information about Three-Fingered Jack was so scarce, the story was susceptible to manipulation from both ends of the political spectrum, and was often used to both support and indict the British slave trade. While many accounts of Three-Fingered Jack depict him merely as a terrorist or boogeyman, including a melodrama by William Murray and a pantomime by John Fawcett, Earle’s treatment explicitly presents him as “a bold and daring defender of the Rights of Man” and “as great a man as ever graced the annals of history” (68, 157). In order to gain his readers sympathy, Earle invests considerable effort into depicting the horrors of the slave trade and the immoral transgressions of those who practice it. Jack’s parents are introduced as a noble people who are, at once, proud and empathetic. It is even Jack’s mother who rescues and nurses to health Captain Harrop, who in turn deceives and sells her as a slave. Earle’s novella captures the tortures of the middle passage and plantation slavery through the eyes of his daring and heroic characters. In his introduction, Earle states his purpose: “to commemorate the name of Jack, and place upon the list of heroes, one who, had he shone in a higher sphere, would have proved as bright a luminary as ever graced the Roman annals, or ever boldly asserted the rights of a Briton His cause was great and noble, for to private wrongs he added the liberty of his countrymen, and stood alone a bold and daring defender of the Rights of Man” (Earle, 68).Since the story is framed within a correspondence between two Englishmen, Earl takes advantage of the many opportunities he has to insert his abolitionist perspective through the letters of the narrator, who denounces the character of Captain Harrop and other slavers claiming, “those are not my countrymen, whose inhumanity is the subject of my page” (Earle, 82).

OpenLink Virtuoso version 07.20.3217, on Linux (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu), Standard Edition
Data on this page belongs to its respective rights holders.
Virtuoso Faceted Browser Copyright © 2009-2012 OpenLink Software