An interwiev with Harriet Beecher Stowe

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An interwiev with Harriet Beecher Stowe´s aunt

I’m sitting down here with Harriet Beecher Stove’s aunt her name Mary, welcome

- Thank you very much.

Can you tell me about Harriet’s background?

- She was born in Litchfield in 1811, Connecticut together with her father Lyman Beecher a congressionalist abolitionist, with her mother Roxana Foote Beecher which died when she was five years old. Her brother and Sister Henry Ward Beecher and Catharine Beecher.
- Her brother became an abolitionist as her father; he followed his footsteps while her sister became a symbol because she inspired women in further educational opportunities.
- In 1832 her family moved from Litchfield to Cincinnati (Ohio) where her father became the first president of Lane Theological Seminary.

Has she ever been married?

- Yes she’s been married once but that was a long time ago. She married a man named Calvin Ellis a priest and widower.
- She had four children but she had three more but they died in a cholera epidemic when they where young.

What did she do during her time in Cincinnati?

- Well she began to gain knowledge about the slavery because in the southern parts of America their where colonies ruled by rich people.
- Her family was not so rich so therefore she had the necessities of motherhood and writing.
- So she began to write books about the Americanisation of the slavery that inspired her.

When did she begin her literary career?

- It began when she and her sister wrote a book named “a children’s geography book” And in 1834 she won a prize contest of the Western Monthly Magazine.
- So in 1834 she began her literary career.

Which was the name of the first book she wrote?

- Her first book that she wrote was “The Mayflower” and she published it in 1843.



What was the Mayflower?

- It was the name of the ship that transported pilgrims from Plymouth (England) to Plymouth (United States).
- The pilgrims became very special because of their opinions, they had come to the new world United States to create an own society after their sense.

She has written other famous book’s can you name any of them?

- The Minister''''s Wooing, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp.

Which is the most famous book that she has written?

- That will be Uncle Tom’s Cabin that she published in 1852.

Why is it so famous can you tell me what the story is about?

If you ask a person about the name of the book he would surely recognize it.
However this book is about a slave in the southern parts of the United States whose name is Oncel Tom. The story starts when Tom lives together with his family on the property of his slave owners; the family’s name is Shelby. Tom’s mother is the family cook and also for all the slaves, Tom is the one responsible for the horses and the stables supervises over the other slaves.
Family Shelby treat their slaves very well, the have plenty of food and their son Georges are teaching Tom to read and write.
One day there was a slave trader coming to the farm, he was interested in buying some slaves from the Shelby family; the family was having financial problems and had to sell of some slaves to be able to pay the bills. The slave trader was interested in two slaves one of them were Tom and the other was a little boy called Harry. By accident Harry mother heard the conversation that her son was going to be sold and decided to escape. She took her son and headed north over the Ohio river, she knew if she managed to cross that river she would be safe, slavery was not permitted by law in the northern part of the United states.
The major turning point comes when Tom decides to stay and to be sold, he did this because he felt loyal to the family, he knew that the family really needed the money to be able too keep and run the farm and he also knew that the family would buy him back as soon as they could afford to do that.
He went away with the slave trader to New Orleans. On the ferry trip Tom meets a white girl named Eva, she offered him sweets and they were talking during the trip. After a while she asked him where he was going and he said that he was on the way to be sold to someone that he didn’t knew, than Eva said to him that she would ask her father to buy him as slave, she rune over to her father and tripped on the way and fell into the water, Tom saw this and jumped into the water and saved her life, the next day Eva’s father buys Tom.
Tom lives with his new family for just over two year as a slave; he really enjoyed the company of Eva which made the time go much faster. But Eva got ill and died, soon after her death her father also died and her mother didn’t want to keep any slaves, so Tom was once again sold.
His new owner treated him very bad, Tom was the whole time thinking about the Shelby family, he still beloved in that they would be back one day. As always Tom was a very considerate man, helping all other slaves, he helped them to fill their baskets with cotton in the fields. This was not accepted by the slave owner so when they saw him helping the other slaves, they decided to punish him by whipping him, they whipped him so much so he died. The same day Tom died his first owner Mr. Shelby came to bring him back but it was too late.
- I think the story is very popular because it describes the society than how it was built but you also get an insight of how cruel the slavery was.

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