Readers Response

After looking over several reviews of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, it became obvious that the book has a large variety of ratings. One of the trends that became prevalent throughout reading the reviews of the novel were that many people felt it launched the Civil War and began a great movement to end a terrible part of America’s history. Another trend seemed to be that most people felt the novel did a great job describing southerners, the life of slaves, and how abolitionists felt about slavery.

While looking at reviews on Goodreads, I found both negative and positive comments on the book. The average rating of the novel on this website is a 3.82 out of 5 stars. Many people felt that Uncle Tom’s cabin was either a great read or a very difficult one. The one-star rating that I read described the novel as being absolutely terrible and felt that the way the novel was wrote was very bad. The two-star rating that I read felt the novel was a great book to describe how white abolitionist felt back in the day, but overall wasn’t a good piece of literature because of how heartbreaking the ideas were. The comment that I could relate the most rated the book 5 stars and described it as, “One of the most moving, provocative pieces of literature I've ever read, and it's the first time that I can recall being moved to tears from a book.” I felt Uncle Tom’s Cabin helped share how cruel and dehumanizing slavery was, which helped ignite the movement to end it all together, which resembles how that reviewer also felt about the novel.

While looking at the reviews on Barnes and Noble, I found the average was a 3.9 out of 5 stars. It seemed that most people had more positive things to say about the novel on this website. One commenter stated, “Uncle Tom's Cabin is an eloquent classic that vividly exposes the brutality of slavery. The personality and morals of various characters in the novel really engage one's attention, reflecting the mindsets of individuals from 19th Century Southern Society.” Another described the book as, “A deep and very accurate tale of life as a slave on plantations.” Both of these 5-star reviews wrote what I felt were very true statements describing the novel. These reviews also supported the trends I found while reading all of the comments, explaining that the book did a great job describing life as a slave.

The reviews on Amazon were the most supportive, the average rating was 4.5 out of 5 stars. The first review that I read stated, “Harriet Beecher Stowe’s, ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ is a book worth reading. Inside the cover of this old time favorite, Stowe easily takes readers inside the minds the slaves, the slave owners, and those with abolitionist-like minds.” This evaluation of the novel goes right along with the trend of other reviews, which describe the novel as doing a great job putting the reader in the mind of a slave.

Overall I agreed with the most of the positive comments about the book and I think Stowe did a great job getting her point across about slavery in a more round-about-way than other authors may have taken.