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FREEDOMWAYS   FIRST QUARTER 1968

and observations, the reader never really feels the mind of a man turned insurrectionist by the repulsive circumstances of his existence. Only in eloquent abstraction does the author allow his character to ponder the question of freedom, to think of an existence outside the barbarism of white bondage.

Nat Turner-the literary creation-suffers the same fate as his real-life namesake: he is enslaved. He is not allowed to speak his own piece-to give expression to feelings and passions that are born of the slave's tragic experience. This is the challenge which William Styron refused to accept as a serious writer. 

Before proceeding, let us outline the historical event on which this novel was based.

On August 13, 1831, six American slaves, led by Nat Turner, started a slave revolt in Virginia that caused profound repercussions through the slave system. Although they were poorly organized and had no apparent plan of action, the band of insurgents (which increased to seventy) struck quickly and with deadly ferocity. In the wake of their bold venture, sixty-one whites, including all the members of Nat Turner's master's family, were killed. The revolt, of course, was crushed. Armed posses of white, the local militia, and Federal troops combed the area and murdered at least one hundred and twenty helpless slaves and "free" blacks. Fifty-three black men were charged with insurrection; sixteen were hanged; many others received even worse punishment. Nat Turner managed to escape his pursuers for six weeks before being captured and subsequently hanged. While in prison, he wrote a confession which was edited by a white reporter and published the following year in Richmond, Va.

Since little is known of Nat Turner's life-other than the confession and what is left of the trial records-William Styron's version on his life is wholly a construction of his own considerable imagination. The writing is graceful and often moving in the lyrical beauty of many descriptive passages; but it is deficient in that interior quality which is needed to breathe the illusion of life and warmth into the narrative. And because of the style, the work reads sometimes more like tapestry than literature.

But the novel fails for more serious reason than flaws in its form. The basic weakness must be examined in terms of the author's attitude towards his subject. When depicting black people in fiction, white writers are guilty of two fundamental shortcomings, to which William Styron is no exception: (a) they are positively unable to

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