The Literary Account Of Solomon Northrup

Student’s nameInstitution affiliationCourseDate The literary account of Solomon Northrup, where he narrates his firsthand experience of being sold at a slave market, presents a startling and vivid depiction of the inhumane reality that prevailed in antebellum New Orleans (Northrup, 1841). Northrup, a freeman who was abducted and subjected to the barbarity of slavery, provides a disconcerting narrative of the interaction between the slave buyers, the seller, and the enslaved individuals awaiting their fate. However, George Fitzhugh's argument in defense of slavery offers a sharp contrast to Northrup's harrowing tale. Fitzhugh claimed that slavery was, in certain aspects, a more humane alternative to wage labor in the North (Fitzhugh, 1857). Nevertheless, if Northrup and Fitzhugh were to engage in a debate, it is likely that they would fiercely contest the issue of the morality of slavery. Fitzhugh's assertion that slavery was preferable to liberty and equality would not have gone unchallenged by Northrup, and many of his contemporaries who saw slavery as a justifiable institution (Schwarz, 2011). Despite the deeply disconcerting and disturbing nature of Northrup's exposé of the slave market, it is crucial to acknowledge that Fitzhugh's perspective on the institution