Critical Analysis of the Octoroon

The Octoroon, all considered bite amongst nonmodern melodramas, is a licentiousness written by Irish motive Dion Boucicaut. The play focuses on the Plantation Terrebonne, the Peyton estate and its residents, namely its slaves. During the time of its premiere, The Octoroon, shake up conversations about the abolition of thraldom as well as the overall mistreatment of the African Americans. Derived from the Spanish language, the word octoroon is defined as matchless who is 1/eighth black. Zoe Peyton, , The Octoroon, is the supposedly freed biological girl of Judge Peyton, former proprietor of the plantation. In play, the lovers, Zoe and the judges prodigal nephew, George Peyton, ar thwarted in their pursuance by race and the the lousiness maneuverings of a material-obsessed overseer named Jacob MClosky. MClosky wants Zoe and Terrebonne, and schemes to demoralize both. Boucicaults play focuses on the denial of liberty, identity, and dignity, while ironically preserving commo n African-American stereotypes of the antebellum period. The play does this through several(prenominal) percentages, most importantly, through Zoe and the household slave Pete. While the origin attempts to evoke anti-slavery sentiments, the play is for the most part in ineffectual of macrocosm a true bill of indictment of slavery by nurture perpetuating the African American stereotypes.\nZoe, the octoroon, serves as a means for the author to explore themes of racial hurt without an excessively black booster amplifier; she is black, entirely not withal black. She plays the role of the sad mulatto a stock character that was typical of antebellum literature. The place of the tragic mulatto was to allow the reviewer to pity the plight of oppress or enslaved races, but only through a humeral cover of whiteness. Through this veil the reader does not very pity one of a different race but rather the reader pities one who is make as blind drunk to their race as possible. Th is is made evident especially in Zoes speech patt...