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Part 1, Chapter 25
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in James, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Speech, Performance, and Willful Ignorance
Identity, Narrative, and Agency
Racism, Dehumanization, and Hypocrisy
Innocence vs. Disillusionment
Family, Alliance, and Loyalty
Summary
Analysis
Jim finds this latest separation from Huck jarring. Wiley tells Jim if he works well, he’ll be treated well. When they are alone, Easter asks Jim if he taught Huck to pass for white. Jim insists he is mistaken, that Huck is as white as both his parents. Easter lets it go and begins to teach Jim how to forge horseshoes. He reports that somewhere upriver, a slave was lynched for stealing a pencil. The story leaves Jim shaken. Easter remarks that white people forget how much time slaves have to sit and think while they work. Jim agrees, saying white folks don’t seem to think slaves even talk to one another.
Jim fears for Huck’s safety, showing how close the two have grown during their journey. Easter’s assumption that Huck is not fully white is jarring, as is the fervor of Jim’s denial. Jim assumes that the enslaved man who was lynched is Young George, and the pencil—though unused for some time—becomes even more significant. Jim’s conversation with Easter highlights how white people assume enslaved Black people are too simple to be capable of complex thought, planning, and conversation. In this way, their tendency to dehumanize enslaved people leads to the naïve and false assumption that those people cannot plot against them.
Themes
Jim tells Easter about Denmark Vesey, who was lynched for planning a slave revolt in South Carolina. He wonders if Wiley would chase him if he ran away, since he is not legally his property. Easter continues his blacksmithing instruction. He asks Jim how many people know, but he doesn’t respond when Jim asks him to elaborate. Jim shows Easter the pencil, and the older man tells him he must write, for Young George’s sake. Later, Wiley comes to check on Jim’s progress and asks the men to sing. They do, and suddenly a group of white men appear dressed in matching dark suits. They introduce themselves as the Virginia Minstrels, led by Daniel Decatur Emmett.
Denmark Vesey is a historical figure who died just as Jim describes in 1822. Referencing him here reiterates the idea that evidence of Black intelligence disturbs white people so much that they punish it with death. Easter’s vague questions throughout his conversation with Jim imply some secret knowledge about him and Huck, which has not yet been revealed to the reader. Rather than blame Jim for Young George’s death, Easter implores him to write, thinking—like Jim—this is the only way to make the other man’s sacrifice worthwhile.
Themes
