Читать книгу Benjamin Drew. The Refugee. Narratives of Fugitive Slaves in Canada онлайн

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That Drew himself transcribed the interviews, and out of this procedure the voices of the refugees or ex-slaves appear mediated and edited by the interviewer, seems to complicate the honesty of the testimonies, and opens the door to question the purpose of the collection. As Clarke openly states, “Drew’s anthology of African American testimony is, to put it plainly, propaganda” (“Introduction” 10). Along similar lines, Edelstein perceives an ideologically based withdrawal, which is admittedly typical of slave narratives, that hints at Drew’s editing move, and warns us that “there are some sensitive issues to northern public opinion that remain either absent or disguised”, citing as examples how “the book does not candidly treat marriage, sexual promiscuity, and miscegenation” (xxii). Surprisingly, they seem to overlook that what lies underneath these political strategies is the way to overcome the distrust of the reader. Most early Black autobiographical narratives were indeed dictated to a white amanuensis or editor who selected and arranged the slave’s oral report, nuanced the style and wording, and provided an interpretive context in the preface and in the choice of metaphors that gave shape and meaning to the former slave’s story mindful of the readership it was about to encounter. Consequently, as William L. Andrews has pointed out, in much early African American autobiography and slave narratives, it is often impossible to separate the voice of the Black autobiographical subject from that of the white abolitionist recording and interpreting the story (vii-xx).