"Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "Go Down, Moses," "Keep Your Hand on the Plow"

The three spirituals "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "Go Down, Moses," and "Keep Your Hands on the Plow" are all poems or songs that enslaved African Americans would sing or chant the words during spiritual that the slaves would hold. These poems or songs, or whatever you would like to call them are also an excellent example of realism. The anonymous slaves who wrote these poems were trying to express their sorrow of their enslavement by describing it as what happened with Moses and his people. They feel they are in the same type of situation and some one is going to come and rescue them. We see this comparison in "Go Down, Moses." They are calling for Moses to come and rescue them from their enslavement.

In "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," we read of this slave who is calling for a chariot to take them home. They will look over and see "a band of angels coming after me" (Anonymous. "Swing" 344). These angels will take her home where her friends could be. This was a very uplifting piece of art for the slaves I believe as they were calling for help.

In "Keep Your Hands on the Plow," we read of a man who is telling Biblical tales and how he is supposed to keep his hands on the plow no matter what. He feels imprisoned and this I believe would have been more of an emotional poem for the slaves. These three spirituals would also fall under the literary subset of realism, regionalism. These stories are from the southern states of the Confederacy where slavery was allowed. Therefore it only applies to the states like Texas, Virginia, Georgia, and other states like that in the south who allowed slavery.

These poems reflect the time period because this was the one time in American History where African Americans were enslaved to white people. These writings would not have happened if it were not for this time period and since they were enslaved, they wrote these spirituals for inspiration. It is how they could manage slavery. These poems have a lot of things relating to the Bible, which I would classify as religious. "Go Down, Moses" is all about Moses and the Biblical story of how he took his people out of slavery and out of Egypt to God's land. So that poem is mostly about religion. " Keep Your Hands on the Plow" also deals with Biblical stories. It talks of when Paul and Silas were arrested and then escaped Prison and when Peter would not let Jesus clean his feet or hands. It also says, "Got my hand on the gospel plow, wouldn't take nothin' for my journey now...." (Anonymous. "Keep" 346). Referring to they need nothing but the word of God.

I think that these poems refer to the American Dream a little bit, as they just want to be freed form their enslavement and not be ruled by the white people any longer. There is also no mention of a literal hero other than someone who would play the role of Moses freeing the slaves. So this could be somebody like Harriet Tubman or Abraham Lincoln. People like these who have helped the slaves to their rightful freedom.




Anonymous. "Go Down, Moses." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffrey Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus; McGraw-Hill, 2010. 345. Print.


Anonymous. "Keep You Hands on the Plow." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffrey Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus; McGraw-Hill, 2010. 346. Print.


Anonymous. "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffrey Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus; McGraw-Hill, 2010. 344. Print.



Kasraie, Mary Rose. "local color." In Barney, Brett, and Lisa Paddock, eds. Encyclopedia of American Literature: The Age of Romanticism and Realism, 1816–1895, vol. 2, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Feb 11, 2011.


Werlock, Abby H. P. "realism." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Feb 11, 2011.

from "Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865" and "The Gettysburg Address" - Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln's speeches, The Second Inaugural from March 4, 1865 and The Gettysburg Address are some of the most famous speeches of all time. They would fall underneath of the writing genre of realism. According to Werlock, "Realism is the attempt to depict life as it actually exists, not as the author wants it to be in the present or the future, or imagines it was in the past. A realist carefully chooses details that illustrate this vision, unlike the naturalist who tries to include all possible details" (Werlock). This is just what Lincoln does within his speeches. This Illinois man does not cut out anything about the nation, he tells it as it is. "Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any other nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure....that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain - that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom" (Lincoln, "The Gettysburg" 402). He does kind of romanticize the whole idea of rebuilding the world after the war, but he mainly does not. He talks of how this war has split the country in two. He talks of the people who have risked and many times given their lives for the sake of the war, and if this war does not come to anything, it would be a waste of their lives. He is not leaving anything out. He tells us of how the nation is at this point in time.

These speeches relate directly to the time period because they are legitimate speeches from the time around the Civil War, and in the Civil War. So these speeches are very relevant to the time period. Lincoln is kind of telling us the state the nation is in and what we need to do to make it the nation it is capable to be. There is a little bit of religion in these speeches. In the "from Second Inaugural Address, March 4th, 1865," there are a couple of mentions of God, "The Almighty has his own purposes...in the providence of God....having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove and that He gives us both North and South.....Yet, if God wills that it continue....with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right..." (Lincoln, "from Second" 339). This speech is kind of centered upon what God wants the country to do at this time. A lot of it is focused upon this. In "The Gettysburg Address," there is not mention of God; at least in this excerpt there is not. This is a big part of the government as well because it is the President of a government and it states what the country he is governing should do. The American Dream in these speeches would be to have the Civil War ended and having the nation be one Union again; brothers not fighting against brothers.

The hero of "The Gettysburg Address" would be the soldiers in the war; "The brave men, living and dead" (Lincoln, "The Gettysburg" 402). These soldiers are common people that are fighting for what is they believe is right. These are commonly the heroes of realism as well.



Kasraie, Mary Rose. "local color." In Barney, Brett, and Lisa Paddock, eds. Encyclopedia of American Literature: The Age of Romanticism and Realism, 1816–1895, vol. 2, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Feb 8, 2011.


Lincoln, Abraham. "Lincoln, Abraham."The Gettysburg Address." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffrey Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus; McGraw-Hill, 2010. 402. Print.


Lincoln, Abraham."from Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffrey Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus; McGraw-Hill, 2010. 339. Print.


Werlock, Abby H. P. "realism." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Feb 8, 2011.

from "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro" - Frederick Douglass

This short excerpt from Frederick Douglass's "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro" is very much so a piece of realism. According to Abby Werlock, realism "is the attempt to depict life as it actually exists, not as the author wants it to be in the present or the future, or imagines it was in the past. A realist carefully chooses details that illustrate this vision, unlike the naturalist who tries to include all possible details" (Werlock) In this short passage, Douglass describes his torture and his bondage of being an African American at this time and tells of how he is not free. He wishes he was free, but he is unfortunately not free and he ridicules the white people for this day of "freedom" for the country. He does not leave out the details of how he feels for them, otherwise known as the white people. It is brutal; "To him (an African American slave), your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery.... a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages" (Douglass 337). This passage is just one of hate towards the people who are keeping him in captivity. I believe this work would also fall under the subset of regionalism. It is clearly in the southern states, since they were the only ones to have slavery. "The primary focus of interest lies in the particular characteristics of a region and people at a particular time" (Kasraie). This is in the south at the time of slavery, in 1852, so it fits this genre of realism. This literary work reflects the anger of not just African American slaves at this time, but also the abolitionists and the freedmen. They were enrages by this "freedom" that black people had at this time and they had their emotions to deal with. This is what we see in Douglass's "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro." This story reflects the feelings of thousands of people just like Douglass at this time period.

There really are no arguments with religion as this is mostly a political issue. The government had no right to keep these people in bondage underneath them, but they did anyway. Douglass recognized this and he was infuriated by his position in the world just because of the color of his skin. This is what we see in this story is Douglass's anger towards the United States' government and the whole idea of slavery in the south. Nature is not included much in this story unless you want to count the nature of slavery angering Douglass to write this story. He believes that he should be an equal and share in the freedom that whites are given, but the white people are celebrating through lies and terrible crimes. He feels very angered by this. The American Dream in this short story by Douglass would be the idea of freedom for slaves, which would eventually come to the slaves, but after many more years of separation. There would be no hero in this story.


Douglass, Frederick."from The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffrey Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus; McGraw-Hill, 2010. 337. Print.


Kasraie, Mary Rose. "local color." In Barney, Brett, and Lisa Paddock, eds. Encyclopedia of American Literature: The Age of Romanticism and Realism, 1816–1895, vol. 2, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Feb 7, 2011.


Werlock, Abby H. P. "realism." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Feb 7, 2011.