Study Of Cora's Anxiety In The Underground Railroad

Colson Whitehead(1969—)is one of the most celebrated African American writers in contemporary American literature,who has received several prizes,including a Whiting Writers' Award,a Guggenheim Fellowship,and a MacArthur Fellowship,and attracted constant critical attention and discussion.Published in 2016,The Underground Railroad is Whitehead's sixth novel,but his first choice of a slave girl as the protagonist,mainly telling the story of the battered plantation slave Cora's meandering seeking for freedom and equality in the antebellum South.With its unique perspective and profound themes,this novel successfully won the 2016 National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize for the following year,infecting and educating readers worldwide.However,due to its freshness,studies on this significant novel are comparatively insufficient and limited,and mostly on topics like themes,writing significance and techniques,paying less attention to the abundant descriptions of emotions within this book.Against this backdrop,this thesis will focus on the protagonist Cora's anxiety,through investigating the origins and manifestations of her anxiety,along with her counteracting strategies,thereby to display the constructive power of the seemingly negative anxiety,and also elucidate its positive meanings for both the individual Cora and the whole black race.This thesis comprises five parts.Part one is an Introduction.After introducing The Underground Railroad as well as the significance of the study,this thesis firstly reviews previous studies on this novel and pinpoints their deficiency,and then illustrates the anxiety theory this paper draws on along with its framework.Chapter one elaborates on the origins and manifestations of Cora's anxiety,including her anxiety of unpredictable fate arisen from the whites' absolute hegemony,her anxiety of disharmonious relations arisen from broken social bonds,and also her anxiety of dissolved self-values arisen from the whites' objectification and degradation.Chapter two explicates Cora's tactics in coping with anxiety.To allay these negative anxieties,Cora resorts to different counteracting strategies,firstly by evasive way,then with the help of others,and finally through her own brave struggle,all of which to some extent promote the improvement of her situation,as well as the alleviation of her anxiety.Chapter three offers a comparatively systematic analysis of the constructive power of anxiety.Under the stimulation of anxiety,Cora actively devotes herself to the struggle with threats,achieving the restoration of her subjectivity;under the promotion of anxiety,Cora rectifies her prejudice and misconceptions of white people,completing her establishment of intimacy with the white group,and under the push of anxiety,Cora gradually walks out from her self-isolation,completing her returning to the black community as well as the identification with her own race.In conclusion,the discomfort and pain arisen from anxiety usually lead to its negative attribute,but the active confrontation and handling of anxiety can empower people to break through plights and gain growth.In The Underground Railroad,Cora's positive developments under the influence of anxiety form not only a strong proof of the positive effects of anxiety,but also an inspiring model for the contemporary anxious black people,encouraging them to keep struggle,transforming anxiety into fuel of the strengthening of black selfhoods,community bonds as well as the power of the “powerless”.