Discussion Summary for 6/7

After a slow beginning to a class discussion (which made me extremely doubtful of my discussion facilitation skills), we focused mainly on the roles of the characters, the themes of protection and racism, foreshadowing, and the geographical location of the story. The characters were introduced in different ways: one as a traveling businessman, one as drunken nuisance, one as a carriage driver, and one as a feeble old woman. As the story unfolds, we realize that there was more to their characters than was initially seen. The black carriage driver ended up being a sort of “protector” for the old lady, supporting/protecting her from the drunken nuisance man that was her husband, eventually killing him in her defense. The narrator, who was unnamed, was a businessman in search of a contract with the old woman for writing in his magazine. Eventually, the narrator became involved with the other three characters and discovered what actually was happening behind the closed doors of Nashville.

As stated before, the protection was seen through Uncle Caesar (carriage driver) over the old lady (Azalea). But the theme of racism was brought out as we discussed the geography of the story. The narrator begins by speaking about the East, the West, and the South, and how he was a Southerner not by choice. We further discussed that he seemed to feel ashamed for some of the south’s qualities, specifically racism. The quarrel about the $2 carriage ride showed how he got upset and started calling Caesar names that he wouldn’t generally bring up, but it was deeply engrained within him. Also, we discussed the aspect of geography in the sense that Caesar was in “the know” about how people operated within the town. However, there was argument that this story could’ve happened in either the North or the South, since it was about an ex-slave helping his slave owner’s daughter. We also discussed that they sent the narrator from the Northern Magazine to the south because he actually knew about the southern ways of living and it would be easier for him to connect with Azalea. Overall, the discussion clarified the reason behind the quotes at the beginning and all of the talk of cities, locations, and details.