I couldn’t figure out if it was fate or faith that had brought me there. How funny those two words sounded when paired together. One was the inevitable, something I could not change in my life, while the other was the hope and belief that I could. ...
The criminal (as slave) often seeks a person of great perfection (and here, as a judge of people's imperfection, the criminal is much harsher than a good man), because he so wants to obtain trust from outside (not through an inner change of mind). If...
Patroller: [in a vain attempt to escape, Solomon runs into some patrollers who are fixing to hang a trio of slaves] Boy, where are you going? Solomon Northup: To the store, Sir, to Bartholomew's. I was sent there by Mistress Epps. Patroller: [the pat...
John's master, in allowing his slaves to marry, was much more liberal than most slave owners, who allowed their slaves no such liberty. As a rule negro men were not allowed to marry at all, any attempt to mate with the negro women brought swift, sure...
A man's servant can live for a hundred years; the slave of a woman dies in six months.
It is better to be a free man in a small house than a slave in a big one.
Call someone your lord and he'll sell you in the slave market.
You are, after all, what you think. Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.
There is something akin to freedom in having a lover who has no control over you, except that which he gains by kindness and attachment
My Master had power and law on his side; I had a determined will. There is might in each.
[The materialist] thinks me a slave because I am not allowed to believe in determinism. I think [the materialist] a slave because he is not allowed to believe in fairies.
The idea of making a film - a film that I had certainly never seen before - about the slave experience was a huge responsibility. It's a project that requires a wider understanding of the geopolitical nature of the slave trade, of historical and mode...
In 2009, at the Vancouver Peace Summit, I met a supporter of Free the Slaves, an NGO dedicated to eradicating modern-day slavery; weeks later, I flew down to Los Angeles and met with the director of Free the Slaves; thus began my journey into explori...
Mistress Ford: [to Eliza] Something to eat and some rest; your children will soon enough be forgotten.
Mistress Epps: Sometimes, you have to beat it from them. [she scratches Patsey's face; Patsey screams] Mistress Epps: BEAT IT FROM THEM!
Tibeats: [after being punched out by Solomon over an argument] You will not live to see another day!
Radburn: Jus takin' a li'l trip, tha's all. Don't want to frighten the chil'ren none over a li'l boat ride, do yah?
The free worker receives a wage; the slave an education, food, care, clothing; the money that the master spends to keep the slave is drained little by little and in detail; one hardly perceives it.1
Just as the slave master required the slaves to imitate the image he had of them, so women, who live in a relatively powerless position, politically and economically, feel obliged by a kind of implicit force to live up to culture's image of what is f...
Rather be a slave to a rich man than the spouse of a poor man.
It is hard to dislike someone you know if that person is someone you value.
