The Downfall and Rebirth of Nash Williams

Abstract: This essay will analyze the character Nash Williams from Caryl Phillips’s Crossing the River from a postcolonial and psychoanalytical perspective. The purpose is to understand how the horrors of slavery and abuse affected the psyche of Nash Williams. Nash is a displaced character in antebellum America who has suffered significant abuse from his father, Edward. Nash is freed by Edward and sent to Liberia with a Christian mission. However, when he becomes a free man, his psychological disposition slowly starts to change. The thesis is that by analyzing Nash through the postcolonial and psychoanalytical perspective, we will get an explanation as to how slavery affected Nash’s psyche and how the freedom from it affected him.