Promote the Equality! An Absurdity in the 21st Century?: Anderson's Message in "Chains"

            Since I finished Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden x days ago, I’ve decided to keep with the historical fiction and am currently reading Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson. It’s a book about a slave in right when America was dumped England who was meant to be freed with her younger sister when their previous master died but instead got sold to a bloody Troy mistress of a husband that would be considered abusive by today’s standards. Also, it’s a trilogy (or there’s at least three books), but don’t expect me to cram all the book in three week like with the Dorothy Must Die series as I’m checking them out form the school library which gives more than two weeks to read the books. It’s still a good book so far but I’m having a couple issues, or at the very least hiccups so far.
           

            Okay reader, it may or may not surprise you, but I am an African American.

*inaudible gasps from amongst the inexistent readers. *

With that being said, I always find it slightly awkward to read books on slavery in the Americas, yet can’t help but get myself tangled up in their webs. Usually when reading said books, I can’t help but mentally cry out for the characters to break their chains and run away to freedom super slick mentioning the title there me. I almost wish I could rewrite the authors words and history to allow the slaves to fight back against the oppressive and unjust white population for enslaving them and liberate all the people. Of course, the logical me has to come out and remind myself that even though slaves were slightly stronger than some of their masters like the females they had guns pointing to their face and little support most of the time that could stand in the way of that. It’s truly a depressing thing to think about and I’m practically being torn apart by my feeling and history. However, with main characters like Isabel who desperately wants freedom for herself and her sister, it’s easy to guess that she’s probably going to get what she wants to some degree by the end of the series, and that freedom is the message of the book. But why?

Okay, so civil right happened years ago and equality is supposedly a thing in America right? What’s the point of advocating for freedom in 2010 (year the book was published) then? We’ve already achieved enlightenment and know that people are people and we’re all equal. Or are we? Is Anderson trying to say that what we perceive to be equality is an illusion and people aren’t treated as equals as when Isabel helps the rebels they still treat her as something to forget about? Is she saying that we must constantly be fighting for equality in the way the slaves help the cause to be free from England and their masters to be seen as equals? Is it that we can’t achieve equality without sacrifice seen in Isabel trying hard to please the rebels but never getting what she wants a metaphor for how America hasn’t sacrificed enough so we aren’t an equal country? What are you trying to say Anderson?

*screams of frustration into the distant abyss of the internet*

…

So I’m though it would be fitting to mention the message of the book this time around since we’re doing persuasive writing in class and because the message of the book is driving me absolutely crazy. I personally think Anderson wrote this book because she likes to write historical fiction and wanted to tell an entertain story, but had embed the message that Americans aren’t completely equal due to the circumstances we’re born in and the abilities we have such as Isabel’s little sister, Ruth, having fits (though they may be seizures) and Isabel being taught how to read by her former master giving them disadvantages and advanced respectively. I’d love to go into detail about what I mean but I’ll save that for the book review next week.