Brer Coon Origin Joel Chandler
Harris Uncle Remus
- Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908)
The name Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908) is not nearly as well known
as that of the famous character he created, Uncle
Remus. Many visitors to Harris's home in Atlanta, Georgia have been
surprised to find that the author of the beloved Uncle Remus stories was
not a aged black man, but a portly and shy white journalist.Harris was a progressive thinking Southerner with deep concerns about post-Civil War reconstruction in general and race relations in particular. Although he had literary ambitions, his greatest achievement was as a folklorist, when he collected and wrote down slave stories that he heard while working on a plantation as a young boy. Harris never claimed that he was the author of these stories, but rather a "compiler" of voices that, at that time, were virtually ignored in white America - the black slaves of the Old South.
This literary giant was, in reality, a virtual recluse who rarely traveled outside his home. This shyness probably stemmed from his childhood in rural and placid Eatonton, Georgia. His father abandoned him and his mother when he was an infant, and Harris grew up a gawky, nervous and thin boy with red-hair and freckles.
By age 14, however, Harris became restless and mustered up enough courage to seek a job as a printer's devil for Joseph Addison Turner. Turner was editor-publisher of The Countryman, a small country newspaper that he published out of his home at Turnwold Plantation. Turner not only introduced the young Harris to journalism, but also to literature through the books he kept in his well-stocked library.
Most importantly, Harris was exposed to the good and bad aspects of plantation life, which would later provide the setting and characters for his Uncle Remus tales.
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George Terrell, one of the Turnwold Plantation slaves who told stories to a young Joel Chandler Harris. |
Harris and his wife eventually had to flee Savannah when an epidemic of yellow fever broke out. By this time, Harris had gained a reputation as a humorist with other newspaper editors, since his amusing columns on local and national matters had been reprinted in various papers over the years. But in his heart, Harris was dissatisfied with journalism as a literary pursuit, and dreamed of publishing his own Southern literary magazine.
Harris's reputation landed him a job as associate editor of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. This job gave him a steady income and a comfortable life. In 1881, he moved his family into a small farmhouse in Atlanta's West End called Snap-Bean Farm. He later renovated the farmhouse into a pretty, Queen Anne Victorian home, which he dubbed the "Wren's Nest" after he found a nest of birds in their wooden mailbox. Here, Harris settled into a routine of taking a mule-driven streetcar to work during the day, followed by an evening of literary writing. He preferred to spend time at home, and rarely traveled.
Along with a humor column, Harris began writing "dialect sketches" for the Constitution when he first joined the staff. Harris's observations were seen through the eyes of a fictional, humble black commentator named Uncle Remus. Through these columns, Harris explored African-American dialect throughout the state of Georgia. He had a distaste for what he called "the intolerable misrepresentations of the minstrel stage," and painstakingly wrote his stories in authentic African-American dialect that he had absorbed as a boy. For someone who never recorded his encounters with slaves, Harris was surprisingly accurate as a self-taught linguist.
"The difference between real dialect and lingo," he once said, "is that the first is preservative, while the latter is destructive, of language. Judged by this standard, the Negro dialect is as perfect as any the world ever saw."
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The Wren's Nest, Harris's Atlanta home |
The Uncle Remus tales brought Harris a lot of attention from learned men, who proclaimed him an expert on African-American folklore. One of his admirers was Mark Twain, who invited Harris to join him on a lucrative joint lecture tour. In 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt singled out Harris's work as an important contribution to reuniting the country after the Civil War, and even invited him to the White House.
But Harris was never comfortable with his notoriety, and the continued pressure to speak publicly made him even more of a recluse. He continued to work for the newspaper until the turn of the century, but centered his attention more on his family and his literary writing. Harris was a common sight writing on the front porch of his home, wearing his trademark black felt hat and spitting into his enameled spittoon. In 1900, Harris left the grind of the newspaper world behind for good, and retired to the Wren's Nest to concentrate on his literary efforts.
Harris finally realized his dream of publishing a Southern literary magazine when, in 1905, he and his son Julian published the first issue of Uncle Remus's Magazine. Despite his desire to write other types of stories, Harris agreed to name the magazine after Uncle Remus to capitalize on his fame. The magazine became another success for Harris, with over 200,000 subscribers.
But by this time, Harris was in poor health. Already dogged by constant illnesses and the tragic deaths of two of his grandchildren, Harris weakened under the strain of publishing a magazine. In 1908, he was diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver, and died peacefully at his home shortly thereafter.
Harris would eventually write 30 books, and his Uncle Remus tales were
translated into 27 different languages. The most popular tale, "The
Wonderful Tar Baby," was the focus of the Walt Disney movie Song
of the South, which introduced Harris's work to a new and younger audience.Despite his considerable accomplishments, however, Harris would, in death, become a controversial figure in some quarters. After the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, depictions of Old South slaves in literature and in the mass media were shunned by a younger generation of African-Americans. The fact that Harris was a white man presenting the authentic (some would incorrectly call it "uneducated") dialect of black slaves made the issue even more racially-sensitive. It is admittedly difficult to judge how much of the Uncle Remus material is a true record of African-American folklore, and how much is Harris's creation.
But if Joel Chandler Harris didn't record the dialect and stories of the slaves, and publish them for the masses at that time, who would have? Harris intended for his stories to bridge the gap between the races and heal the wounds of the Civil War. The continued popularity of his writings proves that Harris, in many ways, achieved these lofty goals.
To learn more about Joel Chandler Harris and his writings, follow these links:
Uncle Remus - Web site with information on Harris and his Uncle Remus tales.
The Internet Movie Database - To learn more about Song of the South, Walt Disney's take on the Uncle Remus tales, look it up in this essential film database.
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Photos courtesy of The Wren's Nest, Atlanta, Georgia |
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