The Known World

“Robbins came to depend on seeing the boy waving from his place in front of the mansion, came to know that the sight of Henry meant the storm was over and that he was safe from bad men disguised as angels, came to develop a kind of love for the boy, and that love, built up morning after morning, was another reason to up the selling price Mildred and Augustus Townsend would have to pay for their boy.”

William grows to love Henry, a hard worker whom William can trust, especially when William has seizures. Ironically, William’s fatherly love will keep Henry away from his own father and mother, as William’s affection for Henry increases Henry’s monetary value. Jones heightens that irony by mentioning the cost at the very end of this extended sentence, which is built on parallel phrases describing William’s loving appreciation (“came to depend,” “came to know,” “came to develop a kind of love”), culminating in a financial appreciation. Slavery’s insidious power comes not only in the ability for a person to own another human being, but in a person’s inability to love another human being without thinking about the cost of flesh.

“Despite vowing never to own a slave, Skiffington had no trouble doing his job to keep the institution of slavery going, an institution even God himself had sanctioned throughout the Bible.”

The irony of John’s situation is lost on him. He vows not to own a slave, following his father’s beliefs, but doesn’t realize how his job, which includes hunting slaves, is in direct contradiction of his beliefs. Because he has sworn to uphold the law, he believes that he can be considered righteous. Also, because he believes the Bible sanctions slavery, he considers himself righteous according to God’s law as well. His inability to look beyond the boundaries of those laws although he knows that something is wrong about owning slaves results in impossible situations in which he must both protect and hunt human beings. As a result of this tension, he suffers from many ailments that don’t seem to ever go away.

“‘You feelin’ any different?’

‘Bout what?’ Henry said. He was holding the reins to the mules.

‘Bout bein free? Bout not bein nobody’s slave?’

‘No, sir, I don’t reckon I do.’”

On Henry’s first day of freedom, Augustus is curious if Henry feels his new status of freedom. They have been busy helping Rita, who is trying to run away to seek her own freedom. Henry says he feels no different, which is understandable given his youth. But this passage is immediately followed by a scene set in the future, when William helps Henry to buy his own slaves. This suggests that Henry is not truly free from the lure of slavery. While he is now free, Henry will go on to be a slaveowner, forever harming his relationship with his father while building a closer bond with his former master, William.

“When the day came when all the slaves were slaves no more and decided that they should choose a last name for themselves, she would not pick Townsend or Blueberry or Freeman or Godspeed or Badmemory, as many would. She would choose nothing, and she stayed with nothing even when she decided to marry.”

Jones often fast-forwards the narrative to the future, showing the destinies of the various characters after the Civil War. We learn which characters marry and have descendants, creating a different type of legacy than the legacy Maude focused on, based on slaves and land. But Loretta’s refusal of a last name shows a desire to remain unattached to any legacy. Her character stays on the edge throughout the story, cautious and careful. She is a house slave, so she has more privileges than the field slaves, but she knows how to keep herself both useful and invisible so as not to be targeted by someone like Maude. She is practical and aware in choosing a partner as well. She considered both Moses and Elias as husbands but rejected them for various reasons. She will not join anyone without carefully dissecting their strengths and weaknesses for survival. By refusing a last name, she keeps herself independent and protected from any loving “chains.” 

“In four generations, Fern’s family had managed to produce people who could easily pass for white. ‘Marry nothing beneath you,’ her mother always said, meaning no one darker than herself, and Fern had not. Her mother would not have approved of the gambler who lost a leg. ‘Human beings should never go back. They should always go forward.’ Some of Fern’s people had gone white, disappearing across the color line and never looking back. She saw some of her kin now and again, a sister, cousins, in Richmond, in Petersburg, carriaging away with fine horses down the street, and she would nod to them and they would nod to her and go on about their business.”

Passing is a major theme in this book. While Fern could pass as white, she refuses to do so, having no particular affection for white people. Yet by teaching Henry and her other students the manners and beliefs of upper-class whites, she is “passing” on the dominant white culture. While Henry could not pass as white by the color of his skin, he is passing in another way, by becoming a slave-owner and adopting many of the ways of the dominant white culture. 

Jebediah Dickinson, “the gambler,” will disrupt Fern and her mother’s ideas about skin color. She finds herself attracted to the dark-skinned slave, who insists on his way of doing things—perhaps being more insistent than Fern—and who might even be more educated than Fern herself. Perhaps he is not as “beneath her” as her mother would believe.

“And he realized, too, that what was happening was better than chains. He had them together, bound one strong man to a woman with a twisted leg, and there was not a chain in sight. He could not wait to tell William Robbins.”

Henry’s crass business sense is in stark contrast to the scene that comes before this, with its focus on the tender and powerful feelings that Elias and Celeste feel for each other. Such love becomes translated into heavy chains that will bind Elias further into slavery. The fact that Henry interprets love as chains is a sharp departure from his desire to be a “benevolent” slave master. Of course, the irony is compounded by the fact that such “chains” that Henry observes when Elias says that he wants to marry Celeste can be easily broken at any moment when a slave-owner decides to sell one of those slaves, separating a husband and wife, or a mother and child, forever.

“All of us do only what the law and God tell us we can do. No one of us who believes in the law and God does more than that. Do you, Mr. Frazier? Do you do more than what is allowed by God and the law?”

Fern justifies her slave-owning by saying that her actions were allowed by the law (at the time) and by God. But Anderson Frazier pushes her, asking how she could own slaves when they are the same race. Wouldn’t it be like owning your family? he asks. She denies his question, drawing a firm line between slaves and family. She refuses any kinship to her slaves. She puts her faith in the clear boundaries of unjust laws because, for the most part, they benefit her while allowing her to believe she is following both civil law and God’s law. But such clarity becomes muddled with the arrival of Jebediah and his own insistence on what is “allowed.” 

“Augustus Townsend would have preferred that his son have nothing to do with the past, aside from visiting his slave friends at the Robbins plantation, and he certainly would have preferred he have nothing to do with the white man who had once owned him. But Mildred made him see that the bigger Henry could make the world he lived in, the freer her would be. ‘Them free papers he carry with him all over the place don’t carry anough freedom,’ she said to her husband.”

Mildred’s words are ironically prophetic. Augustus’s free papers are not enough to save him from the greedy and brutal Harvey Travis, who literally eats the papers in order to exert absolute control over Augustus’s fate. This also shows a sympathetic view of Henry’s actions. In a world that can grab a free man and put him in chains, Henry’s desire to make himself “bigger” can be seen as self-defense, perhaps explaining his future desire to become “bigger,” eventually owning 33 slaves and more than 50 acres.

“But the law expects you to know what is master and what is slave. And it does not matter if you are not much more darker that your slave. The law is blind to that. You are the master and that is all the law wants to know. The law will come to you and stand behind you. But if you roll around and be a playmate to your property, and your property turns round and bites you, the law will come to you still, but it will not come with the full heart and all the deliberate speed that you will need. You will have failed in your part of the bargain. You will have pointed to the line that separates you from your property and told your property that the line does not matter.”

Henry’s natural inclination is to treat Moses more as a friend than as a slave. In fact, when they are wrestling in the dirt, the description of them makes them seem young and childlike, like boys who know nothing of the weight of their actions. William must educate Henry as to the weight of the line between master and slave. Interestingly, William describes the law as colorblind. It does not care that Henry is black. It only cares about the rigid outlines of law. But then, in the next sentence, William shows that the law is indeed flexible and can be made to work in one’s favor. This nuanced understanding of the law is not intuitive but requires an education that William and Fern will work hard to give to Henry so that he can be a successful master. In fact, at the end of the chapter, William insists to Philomena that her free papers, given to her by the law, mean nothing because of his power as master. “He told her that in a world where people believed in a God they could not see and pretended the wind was his voice, paper meant nothing, that it had only the power that he, Robbins, would give it” (146). The law serves the master who can live up to his “part of the bargain.”

“He spent an hour on it, brushing and combing and applying a little sweet oil, and before he was done, she had fallen asleep, which was unusual for her because she always said the bed was the only place where her body could sleep.”

Clara relaxes completely in Ralph’s kind and confident hands. She enjoys his attentions for three more days, until she puts an end to these nightly sessions. For the rest of her life, she uses nails and knives to barricade herself from Ralph, giving in to her unfounded fears and suspicions rather than trusting in his actions. But rumors of slave revolts and revenge have made her suddenly and keenly aware of the consequences that can result from her status as “slaveowner.” 

“‘We together, Massa,’ Moses said to Skiffington. ‘Me and Bessie together. She all I have in this world. We is one as a family.’”

In this brief but heartbreaking scene, Moses pleads to Sheriff John Skiffington to allow Bessie and him to stay together. But John does nothing, and William threatens to shoot Moses if he keeps talking. In the end, Moses and Bessie are separated forever. This brief background gives more understanding for Moses’s later harsh treatment of some of the slaves, including his own wife, whom he sees as an obstacle to get rid of so he can marry Caldonia and become master of his own destiny. After being ripped away from Bessie, the woman he loved, perhaps he saw the need to protect himself by refusing to get close to another unless it gave him the power he needed never to be vulnerable again. 

“Henry had been a good master, his widow decided, as good as they come. Yes, he sometimes had to ration the food he gave them. But that was not his fault—had God sent down more food, Henry would certainly have given it to them. Henry was only the middleman in that particular transaction. Yes, he had to have some slaves beaten, but those were the ones who would not do what was right and proper.”

Caldonia has a powerful desire to believe that her husband was the benevolent slave master that he set out to be. When she recalls how Henry sometimes beat his slaves or did not feed them enough, she rationalizes his actions as necessary since he was just the “middleman.” It was God’s fault and not her husband’s if the slaves did not get enough to eat. But her need to absolve him of any guilt weighs heavily on her conscience, especially as his slave legacy is now in her hands, and she is the slave master. She does not free her slaves as Augustus hopes she will. Instead she continues Henry’s legacy, as her murdering mother Maude hopes she will.

“In his possessions he had one of the first photographs ever taken of life in New York City—a white family sitting all along their porch. They seemed to live on a farm in that city and on either side of their house Calvin could see trees and empty space rolling off and down into what appeared to be a valley, at least on the left side of the photograph. A few of the faces blurred where the people had moved just as the picture had been taken. In the front yard, alone, was a dog looking off to the right. The dog was standing, its tail sticking straight out, as if ready to go at the first word from someone on the porch. There was nothing blurry about the dog. From the first second Calvin had seen the photograph he had been intrigued by what had caught the dog’s attention and frozen him forever.”

The frame cannot capture what has captured the dog’s attention. Calvin is fascinated, wanting to know what lies outside the frame. This is symbolic of his own desire to seek a larger frame for his existence. His family’s experience of slave-owning has created a heavy guilt for him. His homosexuality also increases his sense of alienation and inability to feel a part of the frame that surrounds him.

“The free men in Manchester knew the tenuousness of their lives and always endeavored to be upstanding; they knew they were slaves with just another title.”

This commentary on the free black men in Manchester is particularly poignant given what has just happened to Augustus, who, despite purchasing his freedom, was sold back into slavery. Despite their legal status, free blacks must work extra hard to prove they are upstanding citizens so as to avoid any situation that might deny their status. William Robbins told Philomena that her free papers meant nothing against his word. “He told her that […] paper meant nothing, that it had only the power that he, Robbins, would give it” (144). 

Jebediah’s behavior is in stark contrast to the careful behavior of the free blacks. He cares nothing about his “tenuous” situation. He only cares about the debt that Fern’s husband owes him, even if it results in jail, slavery, and the amputation of his foot.

“That evening he weaved the most imaginative story yet about how Henry Townsend had tamed the land and made the place he would bring his bride to.

‘I knowed the minute I laid eyes on you, Missus, that you was the one to make Marse Henry happy. He had this, that and the other but what he really needed was a somebody to set it all right, to shine on it and prettify it.’ He went on to create the history of his master, starting with the boy who had enough in his head for two boys. He was present at Henry’s birth, he was there the day he was freed, he gave testimony of how all the best white people stretched out their feet and bid Henry to make them shoes and boots that they could walk to heaven in.‘”

Moses uses his narrative skills to gain intimacy with Caldonia, hoping to eventually become master of the plantation. However, Caldonia is not a passive recipient. She encourages Moses’s stories, using them to make herself feel good about her own role in Henry’s life as well as Henry’s role as a benevolent master.

“They were all members of a free Negro class that, while not having the power of some whites, had been brought up to believe that they were rulers waiting in the wings. They were much better than the majority of white people, and it was only a matter of time before those white people came to realize that.”

Fern, Caldonia, and the rest have internalized the Southern white elite structure to the point that they have gone beyond imitation, seeking to surpass the model established by the rich white slaveowners. But despite the desire to surpass the whites, they still use the whites as the standards for their judgment, ironically ensuring that they will never be able to surpass them.

“The only question for us, around this blessed table, is which side should we choose. I suppose that is what those pamphlets want me to do. Choose my side.”

Pamphlets do have power, despite the slimness of their volumes. This pamphlet, like Frazier’s research for his pamphlet, forces Fern to face the morality of her decisions. All of Fern’s life, she has been choosing the side of power and wealth. She “fears the dirt of the field” and makes sure she will never have to labor in it. Interestingly, after the Civil War, she will retain her slave Zeus, who will continue to serve her as a servant. When she chooses to garden, she never has to kneel in the dirt. Instead, she directs Zeus, telling him what she wants done. 

“Who was this new woman, who was this Alice acting like this in the night?”

In the beginning of the novel, Moses seeks the solitary refuge of the dark. But he learns that Alice also inhabits this dark space, and she has been using her supposedly mad nighttime ramblings to map out her eventual escape from slavery. When Moses demands that she leave, taking his wife and child with her, the mask drops and the real Alice is revealed. Alice becomes hardened and practical, slapping the crying Priscilla and commanding attention.

“‘I’m countin on you to run this place,’ Henry had told him after the plantation had four slaves and three more were due to arrive any day from the neighboring county. ‘You be the boss of this place. There’s my word, then my wife’s word, and then there’s your word.’”

In short clipped sentences, Henry gives Moses power over the others. As Henry starts to build his fortunes and hire more slaves, he wants an overseer he can trust. He chooses Moses, and Moses does not disappoint. In fact, Moses sometimes works harder than the other workers, and he has a deep knowledge of the earth and of plantings and harvest. Ironically, Moses remembers this conversation with Henry on the first morning he fails to show up for work. Moses has fallen into a deep depression after having been denied entrance to Caldonia’s home; his dreams of becoming Caldonia’s new husband and master of the plantation are dashed. While Moses has been an effective overseer, he is unable to see how the larger forces at work have trapped him, keeping him chained and unable to realize his dreams. Henry and Caldonia entice him with the idea that he will be the “boss,” but that dream never materializes. 

“How so very different the world would be if Elias did not love her, too.”

Henry views the love between Elias and Celeste as a type of chain that prevents Elias from running away. But from Celeste’s perspective, love provides both transformation and stability. While Celeste does not approve of Elias becoming the next overseer, she loves and trusts her husband, just as he loves and trusts her. The narrator allows the reader a glimpse into their future, showing “the generations of Celeste and Elias Freemen would be legion in Virginia” (351). This narrative perspective shows that they will get through their argument; their love will survive deep into the future. 

“It mattered not how long he had wandered in the wilderness, how long they had kept him in chains, how long he had helped them and kept himself in his own chains; none of that mattered now.”

Stamford’s characterization in the early part of the novel is almost comical, as he keeps trying to find young women because he thinks having “young stuff” will keep him from dying a horrible death. But after he tries to kill himself, he transforms into a new man, soon to be known as Stamford Crow Blueberry. He no longer chases young woman but instead seeks to give comfort and solace to young children, finding joy by giving of himself completely. 

“He worried at that moment that something would happen to him on that road with the white men raging and that he would never see his family again. After Moses, Elias knew he would be next, and then Louis, the son of a black woman. And if they needed more, the white men would jump on the Indian, who wasn’t as white as he always thought he was.”

Once Elias senses the danger of the situation in the woods, he immediately assesses his own particular vulnerability. The complexities of the slave/master/free, white/black/Indian world have created a convoluted hierarchical system. At the bottom is Moses, a black slave accused of murder. Elias is a level higher, as a black overseer. Louis is a level higher still as the son of a white man and black mother. The next level is Oden Peoples, an Indian. And then finally come the poor whites. Although they have very little and must struggle to survive, the poor whites are still free and white, and that is enough to let them rise to the top of this antebellum gathering.  

“In this massive miracle on the Western wall, you, Caldonia, are standing before your house with Loretta, Zeddie and Bennett. As I said, all the cabins are there, and standing before them are the people who lived in them ere Alice, Priscilla and Jamie disappeared. Except for those three, every single person is there, standing and waiting as if for a painter and his easel to come along and capture them in the glory of the day. Each person’s face, including yours, is raised up as though to look in the very eyes of God. I look at all the faces and I am more than glad now that I knew the name and face of everyone there at your home. The dead in the cemetery have risen from there and they, too, stand at the cabins where they once lived. So the slave cemetery is just plain ground now, grass and nothing else. It is empty, even of the tiniest infants, who rest alive and well in their mothers’ arms."

In Chapter 12, the narrator reveals that, in the near future, Manchester County has disappeared, swallowed up by the neighboring counties as a result of a feud between William Robbins and Robert Colfax, the wealthiest men in Manchester County. But Alice has a greater power than those two, as she can bring the county and the dead back to life through her art. All those in her tapestry, living and dead, have their eyes raised up to God, recalling Caldonia’s earlier musing on God’s judgment. But this artwork, rather than inspiring fear, inspires joy and love, and Calvin feels grateful for the lives he has known as he sees them again. His joy, however, is tempered by his feeling of guilt over his family’s legacy of owning slaves. He hopes he can expiate their sins.