Christopher Hager proposes a study of marginal literature not for historical proof but for individual truths about emancipation. In this way, he puts the value of a work on neither its literary nor historical merit, focusing instead on its evidence of individual experience. John Washington’s autobiography is a particularly suitable work for this purpose because it shows the ways in which the changing meaning to him of both emancipation and writing developed his image of himself and his history. Specifically, through both imagining, recording and revising his history through writing, Washington negotiates himself as a newly free man. While Hager acknowledges that the remaining pieces of writing are only traces of this continual development, the writings underscore the role of history and memory in Washington’s image of himself. Specifically, the materials and vocabulary that he uses reflect the legislative changes that slavery went through in the public sphere, as well as Washington’s changing understanding of these issues on the individual level. In addition, Washington refines his image of himself by revising his diary, or negotiating his history and memory. Hager thus also argues for the possibility in reshaping memory for a different self. This is significant because without the means of writing, slaves could not easily record their pasts and base their identity on it. Like the double consciousness, the liminal space between fact and experience, between history and memory thus becomes a space for negotiating identity.

A Colored Man’s deconstruction of the constitution to find his language is paralleled by the way that Washington negotiates the day that Annie rejects him. The second version shows vocabulary similar to anti slavery rhetoric, and places the rejection at the beginning of the summer. Hager highlights the importance of this rearrangement to Washington’s understanding of himself. While the text does not have any unpredictable literary innovation or show historical consistency, the it is thus central to the self that Washington imagines based on his memory. More than law or literacy, Hager points to this reliance on memory as evidenced by writing as central to emancipation, in that it allowed slaves to envision themselves as free individuals who had a past. Hager acknowledges the ability of writing to extend and standardize memory, but emphasizes the fact that it is a reflection of a thought progress, which is never stable or finished. Because Washington’s initial inscription was traces of this malleable process, his second manuscript provides the perspective of one who has since then been freed. The two obviously differ, but are true to the experience of the writer in the moment of inscription. This, to Hager, is the most true thing that remain in slave narratives.