A journey towards the true face of America: the motif of the journey and the little cosmoses in "The Underground Railroad" by Colson Whitehead

Abstract

Travel literature has conventionally been concerned with recounting the adventures of courageous men and women in remote locations to encounter their auras and develop as individuals. Nevertheless, Colson Whitehead employs this literary genre to twist it around and narrate the untold within neo-slave narrative by revisiting the history of the United States. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to discuss the motif of the journey and the little cosmoses through the framework of travel literature, focusing on American history in The Underground Railroad. To accomplish this, some background information on Colson Whitehead is introduced, as well as a general explanation of travel literature or travel writing. Each station will reveal different practices of black oppression that have taken place over different periods of time. Each section in the paper combines secondary sources and close reading to analyze the role of the Underground Railroad and the cosmoses of each station as a different time period in the history of racial oppression in the United States. Finally, the conclusion rounds up how on account of the motif of the journey and the little cosmoses mentioned above, American history has been revised.