Critical Commentary

        Jane P. Tompkins’ “Sentimental Power: Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Politics of Literary History” criticizes Uncle Tom’s Cabin saying that it’s sentimental fiction is what discredits it. “Expressive of and responsible for the values of its time, it also belongs to a genre, the sentimental novel, whose chief characteristic is that it is written by, for, and about women.” (541). Here, the impression that Uncle Tom’s Cabin is only popular because of the way it was written, is given. This statement does seem to give some credit to the novel for being so influential during its time period, but almost seems to accuse Stowe of using the controversial topic of slavery to give this book attention in the first place, and then continues to hold the reader’s attention with drama.

“Consequently, works whose stated purpose is to influence the course of history, and which therefore employ a language that is not only not unique but common and accessible to everyone, do not qualify as works of art. Literary texts such as the sentimental novel, which make continual and obvious appeals to the reader’s emotions and use technical devices that are distinguished by their utter conventionality, epitomize the opposite of everything that good literature is supposed to be.”

         In a sense, Tompkins’ explanation here makes sense. This novel has been considered a political, ground-breaking novel, but we forget that it is indeed a fiction book. Where as Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was based mostly on statistics, facts, and scientific theories, this novel is not. Carson did have a small excerpt where she gave a scenario of what would happen if we didn’t take care of our planet, but she had facts to back those scenarios up and to prove that they actually could happen.

         One could argue though too that although the events written about in Uncle Tom’s Cabin, didn’t necessarily happen exactly like that and in that order, the events most likely did happen at one point or another, and nevertheless, the novel gave people (especially in the North) a real look at what it was like behind the scenes of slavery.