The Personal and the Political Theme Analysis

When Isabel, a 13-year-old enslaved girl, first arrives in New York, she cares little about the Revolutionary War brewing around her. All she cares about is protecting her five-year-old sister, Ruth, and securing their freedom as soon as possible. But very soon, Isabel is swept up in the rebel cause, as Isabel’s new friend Curzon promises her that his master will help free Isabel and Ruth if she spies for the Patriots. Isabel vacillates between supporting the Patriots and the British soldiers, depending on who she thinks can help free her—and the novel shows that Isabel isn’t the only person whose loyalty changes depending on which side seems likely to win, or which side’s win would be most advantageous. Politics, Chains suggests, isn’t as simple as one group of likeminded people versus a group of people who think the opposite—people don’t always fit neatly on one side or the other, since no person has the exact same concerns as anyone else. With this, Chains shows how personal politics can be and suggests that it’s impossible to simply ignore political goings-on—after all, they have the ability to seriously affect people’s lives, for better or for worse.

At first, Isabel doesn’t think politics should matter to her at all, but she soon discovers that politics isn’t something she can ignore. Isabel’s initial belief is reflected in the way she narrates the brewing Revolutionary War as she leaves Rhode Island and during her first few weeks in New York. When Isabel is in Rhode Island, the war doesn’t seem important to her—Pastor Weeks mentions that Miss Finch’s will isn’t accessible because the lawyer who wrote it left Boston during “the blockade,” but neither Isabel nor the white men she’s speaking with expand on what they mean by “the blockade.” In reality, they’re referring to the Siege of Boston, which was the opening portion of the Revolutionary War. But to Isabel, the fact that a war is taking place doesn’t matter, because all she cares about is her own freedom. But Isabel quickly learns that she can’t just outright ignore politics and the war. Within minutes of meeting each other, an enslaved boy, Curzon, asks Isabel to spy on the Locktons (who are Loyalists) for the Patriots (the Americans seeking freedom from the British). And not long after, as the paid maid Becky shows Isabel around the Lockton home, Becky insists that since the Locktons are Tories (a reference to their pro-British political stance), the household staff are all Tories too. At this point, Isabel doesn’t care about either side, or the war more generally. But she starts to suspect that political conflict is going to affect her on some level, whether directly if she agrees to become a spy, or by association since a Loyalist family owns her.

Isabel soon starts to see politics and the war as things that do matter and have the potential to impact her life—and she realizes that everyone, herself included, gets involved with a particular party or side because they believe it’s going to help them. Isabel agrees to spy for the Patriots, believing Curzon’s promise that his master, Bellingham, will be willing to help Isabel become free—in other words, Isabel only devotes herself to the Patriots because they’ll supposedly be able to help her attain her goals. But when the Patriots won’t help her, and she learns that British soldiers are the ones freeing enslaved people, Isabel’s loyalty shifts; she seeks out a British officer, Captain Campbell. Again, Isabel’s loyalty isn’t to the British cause—she only offers to serve the British because she believes they’ll free her. However, Captain Campbell reveals that the British will only free enslaved people whose owners are Patriots, which means he can’t help Isabel due to the Locktons being Loyalists. This is an earth-shattering moment for Isabel, as she realizes that neither the Americans nor the British care about helping her—and so politics and the war seem even more pointless to her than when she arrived in New York. The novel shows that the same general rules apply to other people, especially those who aren’t enslaved: a person’s political affiliation depends on which side they think is going to help them. Despite Becky’s insistence that identifying as a Tory will protect her job, she ultimately leaves the city when the British invade—she’s afraid of the supposedly violent British soldiers and presumably sees the Patriots as less dangerous. Master Lockton, as a wealthy merchant with ties to British aristocracy, has a vested interest in keeping the British in power: continued British rule is how he’ll stay powerful and continue to profit in the colonies. And Curzon remains dedicated to the Patriots, especially once Bellingham agrees to free Curzon if Curzon signs up for military service in his place; the Patriots seem more likely to give Curzon freedom than the British do. In this way, many characters in the novel align themselves with certain political groups primarily out of self-interest.

Ultimately, the novel seems to suggest that politics should be less about parties and sides, and more about helping people find a belief system that guides their actions and shows them what to fight for. Isabel comes to this realization after reading Thomas Paine’s political pamphlet Common Sense, which insists that Americans have a moral reason to oppose British rule. So at first, it seems like reading the pamphlet should push Isabel to affiliate with the Patriots. But Isabel still sees the Patriots as untrustworthy—and irrespective of its political position, the pamphlet encapsulates many ideas that resonate with Isabel. It proclaims that all people are the same, that no one person inherently deserves to have power over others, and that it’s important to stand up to injustice. These sentiments empower her to mentally resist the dehumanizing treatment she experiences as an enslaved person, and to recognize that she (and other enslaved people) deserve freedom and equal rights. In this way, Paine’s words help Isabel develop her own political philosophy and decide what’s important to her—and this personal growth and knowledge, the novel suggests, are far more meaningful than just choosing a side.