However, Chesnutt inverts this model of the South in his portrayal of the external postbellum narratives. Foucault's panoptic theory of the mental gaze supports the idea of paralysis of the slave mentality when physical punishment is applied by masters and overseers. Thus, Foucault's theory of the Panopticon parallels Chesnutt's portrayal of the antebellum South. Through this telling of interior antebellum slavery, Chesnutt describes the South as a systematic structure of labor. Julius must relive the horrors of slavery through his narration of tales in the embedded narratives. The embedded narratives display physical and mental control of slaves by masters.Ĭontrastingly, the external narratives demonstrate physical and mental control obtained by Julius through his method of educating his audience of the past. These tales function under a system of two distinct narrative styles. It was not until 1991 that American literary scholar Richard Brodhead stumbled upon a larger collection of Chesnutt's short stories and published the second edition of Chesnutt's work entitled The Conjure Woman and other Conjure Tales. These stories were limited in number with only seven stories making the first edition. When he was buried, "his death made front page news in black newspapers all over the country." (California Science Center, 2000).Charles Chesnutt's collection of stories entitled The Conjure Woman, which involve the telling of past plantation stories by an elderly former slave named Julius McAdoo to a curious white couple named John and Annie, were originally published in 1899. Some people even brought pins to stick in the corpse to prove he was dead. That's what he would have done." And they did, to thousands of people. Finally, Black Herman's assistant, Washington Reeves, decided "Let's charge admission. Eventually Black Herman's body was moved to a funeral home. The crowd refused to believe that the show was over and stayed in the theater. Herman had risen from the dead so many times before. He collapsed suddenly in the middle of his show and was declared dead of "acute indigestion." The audience didn't believe it. In April, 1934, Black Herman was performing in Louisville, Kentucky. According to the California Science Center (2000): In April 1934, Black Herman collapsed on stage from an apparent heart attack. While the book was sold at his performances, it has since been determined that he was not the author. Herman professed to be the author of Secrets of Magic, Mystery, and Legerdemain, a book published in 1925 that contained a variety of African American Hoodoo practices as well as advice on astrology and lucky numbers, his semi-fictionalized autobiography, and directions for performing simple illusions. He then would lead the crowd to the theater for his performance. On the day of the show, the audience would witness the coffin being exhumed and watch the magician emerge alive. His most famous trick, however, was his Private Graveyard, where he would sell tickets three days before his performance and invite people to watch his "lifeless body" be placed in a coffin and buried near the venue of his next show. His forte included the Asrah levitation, the production of rabbits, and escape from knots tied by audience members. When traveling in the North, his audiences were racially mixed due to the Jim Crow policies in effect at the time. When traveling in the South, Black Herman’s audiences were largely Black. Black Herman subsequently dropped the medicine show aspect of his performance and focused on the stage act. In 1909, Prince Herman died and Rucker, then only 17 years old, took the name Black Herman in honor of his friend. Their show became a combination medicine show/stage show as they sold patent medicine and performed sleight of hand. He learned the art of stage illusions from a performer named Prince Herman, who was first his teacher and later his partner. Black Herman was the most prominent African American magician of his time, well-known for his street and close-up magic. Black Herman: (1892-1934) Another name for Benjamin Herman Rucker, a magician and illusionist born in Amherst, Virginia.
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