Frederick Douglass’s Prophecies of Abolition: World Literature and the Black Romantic Man of Letters

Abstract

ABSTRACTFrederick Douglass’s citations of British Romantic poets have recently attracted the attention of scholars working in two modes of Black Studies: transatlantic literary history and political theory. In this essay, I take as my point of departure that Douglass’s Romanticism indicates his self-conception as a “man of letters” and his participation in the emergent discourse of “world literature.” I show how Douglass reconceived these notions as modes of abolitionist practice. I contend that Douglass explored the generic variety of Romantic literature, and especially sought to exercise its prophetic capacity to address slavery. From the historical vantage of world literature, Douglass formulates a theory of abolition as structurally necessary to the function of liberalism. I conclude by suggesting that this premise helps contextualize the return of abolitionism in contemporary conversations about mass incarceration and police violence.