Rhetorical Strategy and Social Commentary in Joel Chandler Harris’s Works

Narrative Control and Psychological Dynamics in "How Mr. Rabbit Was Too Sharp for Mr. Fox". As part of his rhetorical strategy, Uncle Remus finishes the Tar-Baby story without solving the climactic dilemma and suspensefully ends the story with Brer Rabbit caught in the Tar-Baby but not yet eaten by the fox. Just as Joel Chandler Harris kept readers of the Constitution in anticipation for several weeks before publishing a conclusion to the story, so too does Uncle Remus control the storytelling experience of his eager white listener. He exercises his narrative power and casually pretends to have forgotten the need for an ending when questioned by the boy. Here, Harris psychologically portrays the subtle use of African narrative to augment the boy’s interest and allegiance to the rabbit. Uncle Remus knows the underlying theme that runs through his fable insists on the acceptance of freed slaves into a dominant white society. Appropriately to engender social change, Remus speaks to his ideal audience—a young white boy, who, when he grows into an adult, will need more than a passive tolerant attitude toward freed slaves. Uncle Remus’s storytelling goal is to train the rapacious fox while he is at an impressionable young age so that he will learn to embrace a diversified society with compassion and charity.

Allegorical Meaning and Trickster Hermeneutics. If the Tar-Baby story lays bare the destructiveness of Brer Rabbit’s pride, then “How Mr. Rabbit Was Too Sharp for Mr. Fox” (1881) epitomizes his creative cunning. Harris carefully manages the tale so that Brer Rabbit’s triumph merits praise from the stronger race. Since the animals operate in a lawless society, Uncle Remus emphasizes allegorically that in a world where cheating, deception, and devouring are the common order of the day, men must be self-reliant. Indeed, as Uncle Remus suggests, from an African perspective the world is lawless and chaotic. Freed slaves must be their own defenders; they must rescue themselves from danger, for none will go to their aid since Southern society is pitted against them. Accordingly, Brer Rabbit enmeshes himself so much in the tar that he stands helpless as Brer Fox mocks him with laughter: Only his own actions will save him from his self-created prison. Ironically, Uncle Remus ends the Tar-Baby story with the notion of possible salvation for Brer Rabbit: “Some say Jedge B’ar come ’long en loosed ’im—some say he didn’t” (Uncle Remus 11). However, as the conclusion makes emphatically clear, there is no deus ex machina for Brer Rabbit, and this makes his ultimate witty escape all the more admirable.

Through Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox’s mutual mockery, the story also satirizes human faults of pride, overconfidence, and imperceptiveness. Brer Rabbit’s final exclamation in “How Mr. Rabbit Was Too Sharp for Mr. Fox,” “Bred en bawn in a brier-patch, Brer Fox,” taunts Brer Fox and undermines any lesson that Brer Rabbit may have learned from the Tar-Baby episode (Uncle Remus 19). At the end, he may still be boastful, but he is free and “ez lively ez a cricket in de embers” (19).

Academic Discussion and Analytical Prompts:
1. Read selected tales from Geoffrey Chaucer, specifically the “Nun’s Priest’s Tale.” What kind of device did Harris borrow from Chaucer in his conclusion to the Tar-Baby story, and what kind of literary influence did Chaucer have on Harris’s work? Discuss.

2. Compare the trickster figure of Brer Rabbit to a trickster from another country, such as India’s Jackal in “The Tiger, the Brahman, and the Jackal,” or the French fox named Renart in the works by Michel Rodange. Do these other tricksters also address issues of prejudice based on race and class, or is Harris unique in this aspect of his trickster figure? Discuss your response.

Pathos and Societal Alienation in "Free Joe and the Rest of the World". No other story from Harris matches the pathos that envelopes “Free Joe and the Rest of the World” (1884). Any reader would identify with its rejected, shamed, and pathetic protagonist. Originally published in Century in 1884, “Free Joe” tells of the isolation and tragedy of a free black man who suffers with humility. As a freed slave in the antebellum South, Free Joe is alienated from every social caste. Harris’s explanation reveals the irony in Free Joe’s name: “He realized the fact that though he was free, he was more helpless than any slave. Having no owner, every man was his master” (Free Joe 55). Free Joe’s freedom becomes his curse. As his encounter with “Spite” Calderwood attests, Free Joe longs for acceptance within a white community, which evokes the envy of other former slaves even while the white community expresses its reluctance to accept free blacks. As a consequence, Free Joe becomes a drifting outcast accepted by neither ex-slaves nor whites. As Harris addresses the gray area of the lives of freed slaves during Reconstruction, he complicates Free Joe’s character by making his passivity ambiguous. Is Free Joe, like the Tar-Baby, a critique of silent, unassertive slaves, or is he made into a tragic figure, helpless to resist the waves of white brutality? Many critics answer the dilemma of “Free Joe” by asserting that the message reinforces slavery. As Free Joe dies alone, not even with his dog at his side, these critics see Harris as advocating slavery over freedom for blacks.

Reconstruction Realities and Symbolic Representations. In contrast to this view, Free Joe’s illusion of freedom suggests Harris’s sensitivity to the actual experiences of freed blacks as they integrate into society after the Civil War. With “Free Joe,” Harris anticipates the icy trek of freed slaves as they confront the cold reception of an impenetrable and unwelcoming white society. As Harris shows, the Emancipation Proclamation is only freedom in words and not in the hearts of many of America’s people. “Spite” Calderwood, a plantation owner who exercises as much control as he can over Free Joe, typifies Harris’s depiction of a white society’s antipathy to freed slaves. Symbolically shackled by Calderwood ripping his permission note and reproaching Joe for being near his plantation, Free Joe cannot even cross the property line to meet his wife, Lucinda; instead, he must wait patiently while his dog, Dan, calls on her. Here, Harris emphasizes Free Joe’s societal restraint with the most subtle of symbols—Free Joe’s dog. In Harris’s hierarchy of Southern culture, even Free Joe’s dog has more mobility and assertiveness than Free Joe himself. The permission slip that would represent his freedom is nothing but empty signifiers, for the only freedom Free Joe ever experiences results ironically through his death. Instead of affirming a need for slavery, Free Joe’s death is Harris’s acknowledgment of the many difficulties along the road to meaningful freedom. At the end, Harris invites us to pity Free Joe’s self-delusion by recognizing that this vision may be the closest some former slaves ever get to being free.

Academic Discussion and Analytical Prompts:
1. What clues can you discover in Harris’s use of dialect or content that might suggest that “Free Joe” was written by a white author? Mention some and discuss why they lead to your conclusions.

2. In “Free Joe” how does the dominant society impose stereotypes on the weaker, and what do the ex-slaves have at their disposal to undermine their former masters’ attempts? Cite some examples and discuss each.