A Study Of The Authenticity And The Unreliability Of Frederick Douglass's Narrative Of 1845

Frederick Douglass(1818?-1895)is one of the most famous black civil rights leaders in the 19 th century.He published his first autobiography,Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,an American Slave,Written by Himself(hereafter referred to as the Narrative)in 1845.The Narrative is influential in promoting the cause of abolition.It is considered as one of the best written and most read slave narratives.Douglass' s story was an inspiration then as it is today and his legacy continues to have a far-reaching influence on today's America.There have already been many studies of the Narrative in American academia.By contrast,in China studies of the Narrative lag far behind not only in terms of quantity but also in terms of scope and depth.Slave narratives are generally of dubious value.Despite the claims against the authenticity of the slave narratives,scholars at home and abroad seldom study the authenticity and the unreliability of Douglass' s Narrative.The present thesis will focus on the analysis of the authenticity and the unreliability of the Narrative in reference to the theories proposed by Zhao Baisheng and Xu Dejin.The thesis consists of five parts.Part one includes a brief introduction to Frederick Douglass and his Narrative,and literature review.Part two gives the definitions of biography/autobiography and introduces some related biographical/autobiographical theories.Part three concentrates on the analysis of the authenticity of the Narrative,which is proved by “three dimensional facts” put forward by Zhao Baisheng.In Professor Zhao's opinion,there are three types of facts in biography: autobiographical,biographical and historical facts.In the Narrative,the autobiographical facts tell readers what happened to Frederick Douglass.The narration of the slaveholders,overseers,his fellow slaves,and his family who affected Douglass are adequate biographical facts.The facts pertaining to slave trades,Slave Codes and slave revolts in the United States are historical facts which played a significant role in Douglass' s life.Three dimensional facts show Douglass' s self-development and prove the authenticity of his autobiography.Part four studies the unreliability of the Narrative.Although the study of unreliable narration has become one of the central issues in contemporary narrative theory,most studies focus on unreliable narration in fiction,but unreliable narration in autobiography is almost neglected.Part four will analyze the unreliability of the Narrative according to Professor Xu's three types of autobiographical unreliability: intratextual unreliability,extratextual unreliability and intertextual unreliability,in the hope of enriching the current study of autobiographical unreliability.The final part makes a conclusion to the thesis.