The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass is an 1845 memoir by the former slave and abolitionist, Frederick Douglass. The work chronicles Douglass's life, beginning with his fractured family through his freedom. Douglass was bought and sold as a slave numerous times throughout his life, being beaten and humiliated by his owners. Douglass despised slavery and often resisted his mistreatment, helped other slaves to become literate and eventually escaped to the North. The memoir was widely read and became influential in the abolitionist movement.
The one act play American Dream skewers the stereotypical pursuit of the American dream and conventional family life. In the play, Mommy and Daddy live with Grandma. During the play, the trio is visited by Mrs. Barker, from whom they adopted a child years ago. Mommy and Daddy ultimately destroyed the child, as he wasn't up to their standards. The final visitor in the play is a young man, called the American Dream by Grandma, as he is good looking and everything the couple's first child wasn't.
American Beauty, a comedy-drama, is a film about Lester Burnham, a middle-aged man who falls in love with his teenage daughter's best friend Angela, and his family. Lester begins working out to make himself more attractive to Angela, while his wife begins an affair with a co-worker. His daughter Jane begins seeing the neighbor's son Ricky, and soon enough all of their lives head in unexpected directions. This satirical yet touching representation of middle-class life explores themes of imprisonment, sexuality, conformity, and redemption.