The time spent at Covey working the fields, exhausted, and without any hope left, marked Douglass to a great extent. More precisely, as it is presented in the book, Douglass started inquiring on the possibility to even commit suicide because of the tremendous unhappiness he was living. At the same time, such sentiments did not only come from an exhausting, unequal, unfair, and inhuman way of living, but rather from a desperation felt when realizing that the power of the slave owners is so big that its exercise can transform a man into a slave.

Another important point to be taken into account is the way in which Covey, after Douglass is recuperated from his escape, was found as a symbolic figure to define the black resistance against the slave trade. More precisely, the fact that in the end Douglass...

This image provided by Douglass' novel is also seen in other literary or any type of writing by Douglass, represented at the symbolic level a new step in a different direction for slavery. This is one of the main reasons for which the writings of Douglass were efficient.
Overall, it can be concluded that Douglass's work, "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas" is useful for better understanding the way in which slavery was portrayed. Furthermore it is an important piece of literature. Given the functions that Douglass would later on, it can be said that such a novel expressed exactly the struggles of the slave and the human transformations that are inflences.