De Negerhut
1852
A novel written in the mid-19th century. The book addresses the harsh realities of slavery in North America, particularly focusing on the lives of enslaved individuals like Tom and Eliza, who navigate their struggles for freedom and dignity in a society that dehumanizes them. The opening of ''De Negerhut'' introduces readers to a conversation between Mr. Shelby and Mr. Haley, a slave trader, in which they discuss the impending sale of Mr. Shelby’s enslaved workers due to his financial troubles. Mr. Shelby expresses regret over the potential sale of Tom, an honest and dedicated worker, and the heartbreaking implications it has for Tom’s life and the lives of those around him. Eliza, a young mother, overhears their conversation and is filled with dread at the thought of her child being sold. This anxious beginning sets a somber tone, showcasing the emotional turmoil of the characters and foreshadowing the significant moral dilemmas they will face as the story unfolds.
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“The longest way must have its close - the gloomiest night will wear on to a morning.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Soon after the completion of his college course, his whole nature was kindled into one intense and passionate effervescence of romantic passion. His hour came,”
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“...the heart has no tears to give,--it drops only blood, bleeding itself away in silence.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Of course, in a novel, people’s hearts break, and they die, and that is the end of it; and in a story this is very convenient. But in real life we do not die when all that makes life bright dies to us. There is a most busy and important round of eating, drinking, dressing, walking, visiting, buying, selling, talking, reading, and all that makes up what is commonly called living, yet to be gone through…””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“There are in this world blessed souls, whose sorrows all spring up into joys for others; whose earthly hopes, laid in the grave with many tears, are the seed from which spring healing flowers and balm for the desolate and the distressed.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Any mind that is capable of a real sorrow is capable of good.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Perhaps it is impossible for a person who does no good not to do harm.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“For how imperiously, how coolly, in disregard of all one’s feelings, does the hard, cold, uninteresting course of daily realities move on! Still we must eat, and drink, and sleep, and wake again, - still bargain, buy, sell, ask and answer questions, - pursue, in short, a thousand shadows, though all interest in them be over; the cold, mechanical habit of living remaining, after all vital interest in it has fled.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Treat 'em like dogs, and you'll have dogs' works and dogs' actions. Treat 'em like men, and you'll have men's works.””
— Harriet Beecher Stowe
