American storyteller George Saunders published his first novel Lincoln in the Bardo in 2017, and it quickly took its place in the literary community. It was later announced that the novel had won the Man Booker Prize. Interestingly, George Saunders had never written a novel before this one, he was known in the literary community as a writer of short stories, and it would not be an exaggeration if he was referred to as one of the masters of brilliant short story writing. However, to write a novel – an art that you were not known for before – and then the novel garners attention and achieves several successes, questions arise about the nature of a novel written by someone who was not known in the world of novels. What are the reasons for the success and popularity of this novel?
George Saunders invested all his energy in writing short stories, creating a work of fiction consisting of thousands of short stories. The reader who reads the novel Lincoln in the Bardo will not find the classic form of the novel, but rather will find himself in front of an experimental work of fiction created by a professional writer who is proficient in the art of the short story. There are no dialogues, there are no events, there is no beginning nor end, nothing but voices – human voices that express their love and attachment to life, but it is a life they will never be destined to return to again.
It may come to mind the moment you read the title that we are standing before a work of fiction, dealing with a historical figure who has a central presence in American politics and pop culture. Writing a historical novel requires effort to collect the information that builds the course of the novel, more importantly, how can the historical course of the novel be controlled by the presence of a character, not because he is similar to a legend, but because he carries the history of an entire era, specifically the period of the American Civil War? There are thousands of publications that have dealt with this character, from history books to the literary world, and even the world of cinema. There are modern American figures who have had success in writing historical novels, such as John Williams with his novel Augustus, which is about the Roman Emperor Augustus. Likewise, the American novelist Gore Vidal, who wrote a historical epic consisting of several novels that tells the story of American history, and one of the most famous novels in this series is a novel bearing the name Lincoln. George Saunders will find no escape from comparing his work to the work of Gore Vidal, which carries distinctive artistic and literary value.
George Saunders eliminated all comparisons that would occur between this work and any fictional work that might deal with the character of Lincoln. The reason for that is that this work of his is not a novel written in the classical manner, nor is it a historical novel, and it is not interested in writing history that might extend over a long fictional period. He only dealt with the character of Lincoln in its human context, as a father, and as a real person who has a presence in human memory, who can connect and unite the worlds of the novel, which extend over vast time periods and spaces, within a single moment in time. And what is even more powerful is that all the events of the novel do not exceed a single night, or a few hours to be exact.
Here we are facing a new comeback to the stream of consciousness, creating a narrative space that travels across times and places to describe one night. But Saunders goes beyond this comeback to the stream of consciousness, to build a work of fiction with the help of a cultural idea from the Buddhist heritage. The Bardo region, according to this tradition, is a logical dividing line between death and resurrection, death and rebirth. George Saunders began to roam this temporal space between death and resurrection to create his heroes and characters, to express their ambitions, hopes, and love for life, and their lack of recognition – or uncertainty – that they are dead.
What is Lincoln’s relevance in this space that seems very narrow and extremely vague to the reader, who knows nothing about it except that it is a dividing area? Lincoln is the one who will connect life and death through one of the moments of his family life, which is the death of his child, Willie, a real event recorded in the folds of history. When Saunders writes about the death of Willie Lincoln, we read real historical texts and invented historical texts, as if they were short stories dealing with this historical moment. In fact, they are short stories, or historical pieces, and each piece has its own distinct sound. However, as we read these short stories about specific moments, with multiple images, who said that reality has only one image in these stories? It has many forms, and they may appear to be starkly contradictory. While one historical source describes the moon on the night of Willie’s death as visible, another source denies its visibility, and another likens it to a bright color that it cannot possibly be. This is only a simplified picture, there are other pictures related to humans. When one source describes Lincoln as handsome, another describes him as ugly, another as hideous, and still another as sad. This multiplicity of expressions of truth gives the novel a documentary dimension, although it is not the novelist’s primary goal.
George Saunders derived the main event in Lincoln in the Bardo from listening to one of his relatives, several years ago, telling him that some newspapers reported on a visit by Abraham Lincoln to the grave of his son Willie, and that he had taken his recently deceased child out of his coffin and embraced him. It is as if this scene is a miniature of Michelangelo’s masterpiece: the Pietà. This small event is the basis of the novel and its main structure: death.
The fictional character does not lose its narrative voice the moment the soul leaves its body, rather, it continues to express its presence. But it is an interrupted continuity, in which there is no kind of human connection. The fictional characters meet in the cemetery, they no longer have a physical space to express their presence, but rather souls, floating around in a series of changes and ideas waiting for the moment of resurrection. Does novelist George Saunders give his fictional characters a chance to come back and be born again? Or will he eliminate them and reveal to them the truth to which they are blind and refuse to acknowledge the fact that they are dead?
The idea of the point in time between death and life is the space in which fictional characters express their familial and historical extensions, and their hopes and ambitions to spend more time in this life. This is the most important point that the novelist exploited from the Buddhist heritage. He is not interested in their resurrection and giving them hope to come back again, as much as he leaves them the space for their voices to be heard. This is the other world, the world of forgotten souls who have lost their loved ones and feel a strong desire for a living being to communicate with them.
The novelist increases the excitement of this fictional space with Abraham Lincoln’s visit to his recently deceased child, through his live communication with his son and his embrace of him. It is as if this visit, which is about the father’s love for his little child, has propelled the world of dead spirits into another world, in which it has become possible for there to be communication with the living, for the father to visit his children, the wife to visit her husband, and the children to visit their parents. What is this desire that the fictional character feels, when it finds that there is hope to return again, not to correct the historical course of life, or to be better and more compassionate characters or something like that, but to just live and taste life. This is the main advantage of having the character of Lincoln in this novel, to be a point of contact between the souls in the cemetery, and a central point for their hope of resurrection.
One of the features of novels is that they do not follow one direction, nor are they written in a specific style. There are multiple directions and different forms. To create a distinctive work of fiction is a good and beautiful thing, but to create a new form, and define its boundaries, directions, and the characters that fill it and are unique to it, this is genius, and is credited to the novelist who excelled in formulating it, and to the novel that finds itself in a state of constant renewal. The novel can give a more beautiful and better picture of historical events, and we may even find ourselves facing a moment when we say that this event must have occurred as it was written in the novel. Can we imagine the Battle of Borodino without Tolstoy being the writer of the battle in War and Peace? And so is the novel Lincoln in the Bardo. The character of Lincoln is not discussed in detail, nor is it even considered to be an essential one, except as a focal point, but there are several references from voices in the novel about a man leading a Civil War with unknown outcomes. These references were through multiple texts about the father losing his child, the father’s vision of what is happening as he walks in the cemetery through the world of the dead, and near him, there are no less than three thousand dead bodies that passed in one battle. How will it end and what is the fate of life? We read Lincoln not from the outside, but from the inside. This could not have been done in this novel without the mastery of creating the work of fiction, which George Saunders created so brilliantly.
There are many images of spirits roaming the cemetery, and no matter how present they are in the narrative text, they still need some kind of control that directs them, like Dante in his comedy. In this text three characters were central to the narrative, the Reverend Everly Thomas, Hans Vollman, and Roger Bivens III, they are the ones who guide the course of the novel – without planning or influence, as their souls express their aspirations and existence. When each character expresses themself, they possess an expressive characteristic that distinguishes them from others. There are poetic texts, sad texts, satirical texts, comedic texts, texts for characters who cannot speak a proper language. It is this collection of texts that can create a real world, to express a huge group of people.
The texts may be merely short stories, the artistic scenes may become truncated or incomplete. The novelist cannot exploit the narrative space to create scenes that remain in the memory. In this fictional text, one line, or several pages of speech by one of the characters is enough to create influential artistic scenes. When the Reverand speaks while watching Lincoln walking aimlessly in the cemetery, he uses a metaphor to paint a scene about this character: The moon appeared bright in the sky, so we could look well at his face, oh his face!
Reading this novel could not have been beautiful, except through the translation of the distinguished Omani translator Ahmed Al-Muaini. The translation was extremely beautiful, and introducing the reader to some of the characters who spoke without good manners or expressed a low level of education was distinctive and extremely aesthetic.
Here, I stop talking about the novel and give the reader the opportunity to read a novel with a new experimental nature, in which he will find new things that have not been touched upon before. Yet, how can there be a character like Abraham Lincoln in the novel without talking about the Civil War, and Ken Burns’s great documentary work “The Civil War” and the character of Abraham Lincoln?
After the adoption of the American Constitution in the summer of 1787 in Philadelphia and the election of George Washington as President of the new United States, no event occurred with a huge impact on the course of the new United States. It was a country in the process of federal establishment after independence and the difficult troubles of confederation. After George Washington came three presidents, all of them from the generation of founding leaders. John Adams, who was the first Vice President of the States, and was the representative of the Continental Congress during the days of the Revolution in the court of the French King Louis. Then came Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the Declaration of Independence and represented the Continental Congress in Paris during the revolution as well. There was a kind of fear of entering into a clash with France during the time of Adams’ rule, and there were problems related to the economy, trade, currencies, and interest rates. Despite the severity of some of these problems, they are normal and occur in any country.
There were those who were waiting for the spark to ignite in order to take action and point out the greatest flaw in the American Constitution. In a constitution whose founding leaders stated that all people are born equal, this sentence must take its natural place on the ground, meaning that all people should be equal. But the Constitution contained in some of its articles – without explicitly referring to the word slavery – the continuation of slavery and the protection of its continuity. In fact, some members of the American Congress who fought to strengthen the foundations of slavery bragged about its triumph and maintained the flow of more slaves from Africa to the new United States of America. There were opponents of these articles, but political bargaining – in order to complete a constitution that brings together and unifies – led them to drop their opposition and adopt these articles.
But approving and ratifying the Constitution would not stop the spread of the idea. The dialogue between the members of the congress was about the Constitution and all its articles, including judiciary, governance, legislation, rights, trade, and elections. All of these were settled and agreed upon, and some of them continued for a long time and went through several amendments, but the articles related to slavery require a special kind of treatment. Either humans will rise to the ranks of holy beings and declare their rejection of all forms of injustice, oppression, and slavery, which of course will not happen, or blood will be shed among human beings, and this solution is more realistic.
For more than sixty years, the American Constitution preserved this idea of evil until the first spark of blood. But before the spark was unleashed, what was the history of slavery, liberation, and slavery like? The idea of slavery continued to circulate among the clergy who “rejected” this evil, and among some lawyers and men of law. It had been circulating among the population for decades, in the press and at election rallies. Some politicians change their minds, when they are outside the political game, they completely reject it, and when inside the arena of conflict, they are in-between. They refuse but seek to gradually abolish it.
The history of the idea requires a chronicle that includes literary texts, poems, letters, speeches, events, stances, accurate statistics, and knowledge of the method of the judicial and legislative system in each state and its relationship with slavery. Such history may be a huge project that spans across an entire generation, and under these circumstances, it is difficult to fully understand the history of the idea because of the vastness of the material. If I were to write a short biography on the idea of slavery and bondage, it would, of course, begin twenty-two years after the adoption of the American Constitution, in the State of Kentucky specifically, where the boy who would change the features of the American continent was born: Abraham Lincoln. This choice is undoubtedly due to the fact that this man was President of the United States in the most critical and fatal years of its existence, when slavery reached its maximum extent, and became a threat to the Constitution, the unity of the state, and its continental union all at once. But before getting into the fray of the Civil War: Who is Abraham Lincoln?
No American president or figure has received as much attention as Lincoln. The works written about him are difficult to enumerate. There is a famous saying that Jefferson is a global currency, and Lincoln is a local American currency. I think the description given to Jefferson is correct, as he is more of a thinker than a president, but Lincoln, in his localism, is greater than Jefferson’s globalism, as he has become superior to him. The majority of historians of American history have been interested in the history of the Lincoln family on both the paternal and maternal sides, seeking to understand the source of the brilliance and genius of the man who led the country in its darkest days and its modern history. However, what was discovered was nothing but poverty, and moving from one place to another so that they could live in dignity. As a boy, Lincoln described life in Indiana by saying: There we die. Did he imagine – as a boy who farmed the land with his father, and lost his mother and his older sister at an early age in his life – that the fate of this land on which he was born would depend on him, the young man who was born like any boy on the American continent? Without prestige, without an ancient lineage with history and resonance, without wealth, without education? Did he imagine that the hands that were cultivating the land would be able to write a decision that would eliminate the tragedies of slavery on the continent, ignite wars, and declare peace?
The child whose brilliance many historians sought to understand had never entered school. Rather, the total number of days he spent in formal basic education does not even exceed one year. The need to work and address household needs prompted him to work hands-on in the fields and transport goods with his father. It is said that when he was older, he went to a school with his friends. His friends left after a brief look at the school, and he was left alone, standing and watching the children’s joy in the schools. His reaction was that for the first time in his life he was witnessing such joy. The boy grows up, and with him the ambitions of a young teenager who finds reading a kind of refuge, where he finds the knowledge that is untaught in schools and universities. He wanted to be a land surveyor, so he spent long nights reading about arithmetic and land planning until he became an assistant surveyor in the modern areas of the States. He wanted to become a lawyer, and he did not think it was too late. All he had to do was stay at his workplace, sit under the shade of the trees, read Shakespeare, the Old and New Testament, and law books, and carry the desire inside his heart with all determination, and he would achieve his aspiration. One of the students asked him about the best way to study law, he answered by saying: If you are truly determined to become a lawyer, then you have accomplished half the task. It is not important that you study under anyone, because I did not study under anyone. Take the books, read them, and study them well until you understand the most important things in them, for that is what is important. It is not useful for you to study in a major city, I studied in New Salem and its population did not exceed three hundred. Moreover, books and your ability to understand them do not differ depending on the place, and always remember that your determination to succeed is more important than any other consideration.
A judge, who lived in the same period as Lincoln when Lincoln was a lawyer, wrote a description of him:
There is no need to attribute to him qualities and advantages that he does not have. He was not skilled in academic sciences, and he acquired the knowledge of law through individual study and practice. Nature endowed him with sharp intelligence and sound perception, which made him a good judge of the motivations for human actions. His voice was profane and his appearance was poor and did not indicate superior intelligence, and he did not possess any of the characteristics of an articulate orator, but he had an active mind and precise perception, so that he understood the complexities of his profession, and he became one of the most capable thinkers and orators in this state, and he also became one of the best lawyers thanks to the depth of his insight, the clarity of his expression, the strength of his argument, and his resort to proverbs.
While Lincoln was a member of the state legislature, Lincoln’s vision of slavery emerged. It was an initial vision, incomplete, that is, not final. It was the first stage among the stages and changes that ended with the liberalization decision. During that period when he was a legislative member, resentment against slavery swept through the Eastern States, and this resentment extended to the West. Associations calling for the abolition and prohibition of slavery were established, and some of the leaders of these associations were assassinated. One historian said that Lincoln looked at this innovation coming from the East with caution and suspicion. Deep down, he hated slavery and considered it evil, but he was born in Kentucky, and he was surrounded by people who favored slavery and did not see anything wrong with it, so he was not enthusiastic about the fervent resistance shown by the people of the Eastern States. Lincoln’s first declared position occurred when one of the councils in which Lincoln was a member issued a resolution denouncing the abolitionist societies and the teachings they adopted, and describing the ownership of slaves in the states that permitted it as a sacred right, and the states should not be deprived of that right. No one signed this letter, and in exchange for this denunciation, history recorded Lincoln’s first position with Dan Stone, in which they protested this speech, and believed that slavery was based on injustice and political error, but spreading the teachings of prohibition only exacerbated the problem, not solved it.
The second vision came after the Mexican War, when Lincoln was a senator. The results of this war were like a gain for one sector, and a loss for another, as the biggest beneficiaries were the supporters of slavery. After obtaining new lands, they could create new states and implement slavery in these lands similar to the states that practice slavery. Lincoln was not popular with a large segment of the Council, as he was from the Liberal Party, and joined the party in attacking the Mexican War and challenged the American president at the time to prove that the Mexican War was legitimate and for defensive reasons, not offensive ones. In that legislative term, Lincoln introduced a bill that would outlaw slavery in any territory taken from Mexico. The project failed despite a huge number of modifications.
The third vision carries a great paradox: it was a vision that did not bring a major development in the history of slavery, but it catapulted Abraham Lincoln into the world of politics again after he had left it. As a result of this vision, the Republican Party was established, of which he was one of the founding members. If there had not been a representative named Stephen Douglas, Lincoln would have been an unknown figure in history, known only as a lawyer. Douglas was chairman of the Congressional Committee on Territories, and introduced a bill called the Nebraska Project. This law would give the people of the North the right to return to practicing slavery again, and the central government would not have the authority to prohibit or approve, but rather the decision would return to the people themselves, that is, the people of the state. If the people wanted slavery to return, they would have the right to do so, and if they wanted to prevent it, they would have the right as well. After five months of deliberations, the law was approved and signed by the President of the Republic. Here, the fugitive from the world of politics returned to the field, becoming a popular figure. Lincoln became famous at the time as an orator who spoke at rallies against this law. One historian describes the effect of Lincoln’s speeches as saying that some people left the hall with the certainty that a major catastrophe was about to befall the country. One spectator wrote: It was a very angry day. Lincoln took the stage without his jacket, he began his speech slowly and hesitantly, but without errors in language, dates, or facts, which demonstrated his knowledge of the subject and his confidence that he was right. His voice was thin, but strong, with a far-reaching tone, and it gradually began to rise in enthusiasm. The words flowed quickly, his face shone with rays of genius, and his body moved in harmony with his thoughts, as he gestured with his head, not with his hands. His speech was characterized by simplicity and clarity that captured both minds and hearts.
What was Lincoln’s vision then? He had not yet joined the supporters of the abolition of slavery and did not enumerate the atrocities as the pioneers who opposed slavery did, but rather limited himself to the legal aspects of the issue. He does not call for the abolition of slavery all at once. If there is a way to abolish slavery, it is an abolition based on neutralization, besiegement, and then gradual abolition over time. But Lincoln’s speeches did not make him a lawyer who prioritized the law, in fact, he became a popular star among the anti-slavery fighters, and many of the heads of the anti-slavery associations called for a meeting, to form a new front to be joined by an articulate orator who presented arguments and proofs like Lincoln, but Lincoln backed down. He was aware of his reality, he knew that if he had joined these groups, he would have fallen completely and would not have risen to the position that he aspired to fill. The parties were in a state of flux and flow, and no one knew where their position was and where it would end.
This is a letter by Abraham Lincoln that he wrote to his friend Speed, in which he presents his confusion and political doctrine, and it explains Abraham Lincoln’s vision regarding slavery before he became president. The letter stated:
Dear Speed. You suggest that in political action now, you and I would differ. I suppose we would; not quite as much, however, as you may think. You know I dislike slavery; and you fully admit the abstract wrong of it. So far there is no cause of difference. But you say that sooner than yield your legal right to the slave – especially at the bidding of those who are not themselves interested, you would see the Union dissolved. I am not aware that anyone is bidding you to yield that right; very certainly I am not. I leave that matter entirely to yourself. I also acknowledge your rights and my obligations, under the constitution, in regard to your slaves. I confess I hate to see the poor creatures hunted down, and caught, and carried back to their stripes, and unrewarded toils; but I bite my lip and keep quiet. In 1841 you and I had together a tedious low-water trip, on a Steamboat from Louisville to St. Louis. You may remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio, there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me […] You ought rather to appreciate how much the great body of the Northern people do crucify their feelings, in order to maintain their loyalty to the Constitution and the Union. I do oppose the extension of slavery, because my judgment and feelings so prompt me; and I am under no obligation to the contrary. If for this you and I must differ, differ we must […] I plainly see you and I would differ about the Nebraska-law. I look upon that enactment not as a law, but as violence from the beginning. It was conceived in violence, passed in violence, is maintained in violence, and is being executed in violence. I say it was conceived in violence, because the destruction of the Missouri Compromise (a law prohibiting slavery), under the circumstances, was nothing less than violence. It was passed in violence, because it could not have passed at all but for the votes of many members in violent disregard of the known will of their constituents. It is maintained in violence because the elections since, clearly demand its repeal, and this demand is openly disregarded. […] The slave-breeders and slave-traders are a small, odious and detested class, among you; and yet in politics, they dictate the course of all of you, and are as completely your masters, as you are the master of your own negroes. You inquire where I now stand. That is a disputed point — I think I am a whig; but others say there are no whigs, and that I am an abolitionist. […] Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it “all men are created equal, except negroes” When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read “all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics.” When it comes to this, I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty — to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.
The fourth vision of slavery is different from the previous ones. As if it was disavowing his previous opinions! He denied much of what he said about slavery, refused to even think about giving slaves the right to vote, and stated that he would prefer that they be returned to their countries of origin. How can this vision be combined with previous visions that were against the idea of the spread of slavery? We must look at the political era and context. These statements occurred during an election race between Lincoln and Douglas. Everything is permissible in the elections. There are many issues, including trade, governance, and other matters, however, not all issues have a place on the voters’ agenda, only the subject of the Kansas Law and slavery was the center of the attention. Due to the intensity of the conflict and the attempt to win votes, these statements were made. Douglas favored popular sovereignty in decision-making. Lincoln favored a government decision to ban slavery in the new states and try to neutralize its spread. The result of the elections was that Lincoln lost his seat in the U.S. Congress.
The fifth vision took place in a different time, with Lincoln becoming president. Choosing him for the presidency was surprising and strange. A contemporary English lord described choosing Lincoln for the presidency as astonishing. There are candidates for the presidency who were born into poverty, but none of them bore the sores of poverty and deprivation as Lincoln did. What will his vision be like in this position? It is as if he is trying to hold the stick between the North and the South, and to walk oscillating, trying to adjust the rhythm and stop the division in the house. It was no longer an order to free slavery or a law to restart the slave trade in the new states. It became a threat to the entire federal entity. After the idea of liberating slaves had been a priority, it became second place, even a distant one, and the unity of the land was more important than anything else, even the liberation of slaves. This stage can be encapsulated through a citation from Lincoln’s letter to the editor of the New York Tribune, Horace Greeley, in which he said:
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.
Lincoln’s sixth vision was a convergence of interests: freeing slaves and saving the Union at once. In his early days, before the Civil War, he affirmed that he would not interfere at all with the slaves of the Southern States, which was their right and would be protected under the Constitution. But after four years, this will no longer be his view. It is possible to save the nation and the union by freeing slaves, as freeing slaves has become a military necessity. Anyone who has ever read Uncle Tom’s Cabin will remember Lincoln’s reference to the author as the fuel that ignited the American Civil War. This statement reflects political cunning and not truth. The first goal of the war from Lincoln’s perspective was the Union, not the liberation of slaves. If he can return the state to its federal state without liberating the slaves, he will do so, and if the Union will not be achieved without liberation, he will issue the liberation decision. There is an issue/ a point that opponents of Lincoln exploit about the emancipation of slaves, which is some states that were allied with the Northern Union and where slavery was still practiced. Lincoln did not impose his opinion on the matter and did not issue a decision to free them. Even shortly before the war ended, one of the generals issued a decision to free slaves in one of the states. Lincoln rejected the decision and annulled it, maintaining his legal right to issue this decision alone and at the appropriate time. With the tremendous rise and success of Union leaders Grant and Sherman on the war front, Lincoln revealed what he considered to be the greatest truth: that by issuing the Emancipation Act, Lincoln would shake the Southern army and draw them to the North. Lincoln then issued what is known as the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, which stipulates that all slaves living in Confederate territory are free from the moment the resolution is announced. The federal government, including its military and naval authorities, must recognize and protect their freedom. In parallel with the liberation decision, the announcement included an invitation to all blacks to join the Union forces and enter the battle. From a political-military standpoint, Lincoln speaks of this war as saying that it cannot stop without the liberation of slaves being a primary goal and objective. Naturally, Lincoln would propose this project to his ministers for consultation. This did not happen. He met with them and presented the issue to them and wanted to listen to their opinions. Lincoln’s government is different from any other government: each one of them is worthy of succeeding Lincoln, and what is strange is that the majority of these ministers were his main rivals in previous elections, and his staunchest political enemies. His government’s opinion was to wait to achieve even a simple military victory until announcing this decision, and this is what happened, as after securing Pennsylvania from the danger of the Confederate forces, the decision to free the slaves was announced.
The eighth and final vision was evident in Lincoln’s presidential inauguration speech after his election for the second time. This speech is a great document, in which he says:
Neither party expected for the war, the magnitude, or the duration, which it has already attained. […] Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the seat of other men’s faces; […] The prayers of both could not be answered; that of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. ‘Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh!’ If we shall suppose that American Slavery is one of those offences which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South, this terrible war, as the woe due to those by whom the offence came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a Living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope–fervently do we pray–that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bond-man’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord, are true and righteous altogether.”
Over the past few years, I have been looking forward to watching the huge documentary by American director and producer Ken Burns, The Civil War. However, I would have preferred to watch it while I was aware of some of the data, foundations, policies, and the idea on which the documentary was based. Watching a documentary about the Civil War requires reading the history of Abraham Lincoln. In order to know the idea behind the Civil War, you must go back to the moment when the American Constitution was approved to see how the path of ideas was from the Philadelphia Convention until the beginning of the Civil War. I discovered many things on this reading journey. Before the discovery, it was a rich reading journey, I read several books about American history at the time of revolution and independence, and I read Thomas Jefferson’s memoirs, two books about the American Constitution, and several books about Abraham Lincoln, his memoirs, and letters. The topic of the civil war has become clear to me, but how will the Civil War appear in the documentary?
The Civil War, directed by Ken Burns, is a unique work. It is extremely professional and is not based on re-enacting war scenes nor does it revolve around historians narrating or analyzing events while adding some footage from the locations of the event.
It is a work of visual literary art based on a huge collection of archival images. Over a million Civil War images. These pictures refer to multiple situations: pictures of soldiers, individuals, armed groups, attacks, defense strategies, artillery firing, war leaders, civilian pictures, military pictures, pictures that contain a lot of life, and pictures that reveal the meaning of death. The photographic camera captured everything during that era. Ken Burns brought these images to life and gave them his own influence. The image is not displayed only once in its complete form. There are several methods or effects that the director planned in directing the work. To make the picture more exciting and dramatic, the camera moves on one picture from bottom to top, or vice versa, from top to bottom. Quietly, consistent with the narration, the picture stops the moment the narration stops. It may happen that the camera focuses on a small part of an image depicting a battlefield, and then the director gradually reveals the features of the image until the image appears in its full form. Sometimes the effect is by displaying images in a sequential and quiet manner whenever they agree with the narrative, such as showing a picture of a Southern military commander speaking about the hopes of the Southerners, and a later picture of a Northern commander cursing the monkey – as he described it – that is sitting in the White House.
The second characteristic that distinguishes this work is that it is a literary work based on historical texts, memoirs, speeches, quotations, thoughts, and poems by multiple figures with no apparent connection between them. In moments, the Northern military commander, William Sherman, addresses us in a voice that matches his appearance as it appears on the display screen. Then, a soldier whom no one knows, but whose thoughts have been mentioned because they are recorded and published, speaks to us. It is not necessary for a person to be famous in order for his conversations to appear in a documentary. Even the smallest soldier or any unknown figure has a presence in the documentary, because they documented the course of the Civil War with their pen. The main narrator narrates the features of the Civil War, tracing its first steps. He stops often to rest, giving the leaders, soldiers, and others room to speak from their memoirs and thoughts. Every person has a voice that distinguishes them – just as their image distinguishes them as well. The documentary became like Tolstoy’s novel War and Peace but set in America and written by well-known and unknown figures from American history. I said that this work is similar to Tolstoy’s novel because there is literary pleasure in the texts and memoirs in the documentary narrative. When I listen to General Sherman’s memoirs, I see his madness, when he declares that war is just hell, and when you want to end it, you must be violently cruel until you overcome it and end it forever. When I listen to Robert Lee’s voice, I find a figure who became a legend in the Civil War, but he was on the side that lost. Each character provides some kind of literary pleasure. In moments when archival images dominate, a limited number of historians, not exceeding five, talk about the course of events. When some of these historians speak, I feel that they are commenting on the event as if it were happening now, and they were in the middle of it. Perhaps the most famous of these speakers is Shelby Foote. The most wonderful stories in this work are when Shelby Foote’s face appears as he conveys comic conversations or situations that take place between leaders and soldiers during wartime, and he tells them as if he lived them himself. When historian Ed Pierce appears, you feel that he is a theatrical actor and not a historian. He speaks and conveys conversations and feelings as if he were an actor on stage playing the role of one of the generals.
I remember that after I finished the sixth episode – and there were three episodes left at that time – I said to myself that Lincoln was a great figure in the Civil War, but the subject of the Civil War was much bigger than him. Before he was president, there were American figures who founded movements to free slaves. The sound was loud and not quiet. A fanatic attacked the headquarters of a newspaper run by an anti-slavery priest, and when Reverend Elijah Lovejoy goes out trying to defend the printing press, he gets killed as a result. This incident caused trauma, even many who thought they had nothing to do with the issue of slavery discovered the mistake. One of the church leaders asked in a Sunday sermon: The question is no longer whether we free the slaves, but rather the question is whether we are free or slaves under mob law. Then one of the men stood at the back of the church and raised his right hand and said: Here before God and in the presence of these witnesses I dedicate my life to the destruction of slavery. His oath was a pledge. That man was John Brown, he had a dream, which seemed romantic, to free the slaves, arm them, and lead a fierce war against their oppressors. He believed that he was charged with a mission to carry, which was to destroy slavery. He and his sons captured five slave masters and hacked them to death, they seized weapons stores and took hostages, including George Washington’s grandson. Brown’s movement was unsuccessful, the majority of its members were killed, and John Brown was arrested and put on trial. He was sentenced to death for treason against the state. American philosopher Ralph Emerson described John Brown as the Messiah. The American novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne said that the execution was just, and the American novelist Herman Melville described Brown as a meteor of war, and Melville was right. Brown’s words resonated loudly, igniting a fire and causing a state of tension. It was a small flame, big in its impact, that blew up the entire continent and made this land a true hell.
The term “civil war” may refer to a conflict between the official state army and a rebel movement or militia. In the United States, the conflict was between real organized armies, as there are no traces of militias. The leaders on both sides are true military leaders, and while the North may be overlooked for their connection to the formal federal system, the Southern Confederate States – which declared their secession – were no less powerful than the North and had leaders capable of humiliating the Federal army to the utmost extent. Is there anyone who denies that the commander of the Confederate forces, Robert Lee, was requested by Lincoln to lead the Union forces in the North, and Lee refused, explaining that his state, Virginia, was more worthy of defending against the Northern Army of the Potomac? The intensity of the war and conflict between the North and the South pushed the industry to a point that the military industry had not reached. At least 250 new patents were registered for weapons and technologies that aid the war effort. What makes the topic of civil war so exciting and hellish is that Europe had gotten rid of Napoleon through the Battle of Waterloo at that time. As for America, it began its own Waterloo, the Battle of Shiloh, and the number of deaths in this battle exceeded the Battle of Waterloo. The commander of the Northern forces – and later president – Ulysses Grant said that the land of Shiloh was fully covered with dead bodies that it would have been possible to walk over them in any direction without a foot touching the ground. However, this was only the beginning. This battle would be followed by several more, so Waterloo would feel like a picnic in comparison. The Civil War would take place in more than ten thousand locations. Cities would become devoid of men and women would enter the workforce to support their families. More than 620,000 would die in five hellish years, a loss the United States had never witnessed.
Looking at the Civil War from a distance makes the images romantic. Lincoln had a leading role in the Civil War, but President Davis of the Southern States had a role completely parallel to Lincoln’s, neither of them exceeding the other. The political voice in terms of searching for a peaceful solution to the issue was not on the table, as the loudest voice of the war belonged to the leaders. On the Northern side, Lincoln suffered from generals who were unable to achieve any significant victories in the history of the war, and leader followed by leader until he recklessly appointed Ulysses S. Grant. There was opposition to Grant assuming command of the army. How can he be appointed army commander while he was a drunk? It doesn’t matter, says Lincoln, he fights and if he had known what kind of drink Grant was drinking, he would have bought it and distributed it to all the leaders and military personnel, so that they might become like Grant and achieve victories through which the war could be ended. As for the South, it did not suffer because of the presence of competent military leaders. Robert Lee was a military leader, and he named his army the Army of Northern Virginia, to emphasize his loyalty and identity, and he was assisted by General Stone Will Jackson. Jackson and Lee, if they had been in the Northern camp, the war would have ended shortly. These two humiliated the federal forces tremendously. Their decisions were improvised, far from logic, and involved recklessness and risk, but they believed that their belief in their cause pushed them to achieve victory.
I believe that anyone who wants to know the American system, American thought, American politics, American history, or American law must know what happened two centuries ago, and the reasons that led to this war. These five years filled with blood are sufficient to answer the questions that arise in our own time of war.
One of the most unforgettable things about The Civil War is the repetitive, tremulous violin tone, which, as one critic says, somehow revealed in its languid, nostalgic singing voice the essence of the tragedies of the great struggle.
T1615
