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My Bondage and My Freedom
Écrit par Frederick Douglass
Raconté par Don Hagen
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This is Ex-slave Frederick Douglass's second autobiography. it was written after ten years of reflection following his legal emancipation in 1846 and his break with his mentor William Lloyd Garrison catapulted Douglass into the international spotlight as the foremost spokesman for American blacks, both freed and slave. Written during his celebrated career as a newspaper editor and speaker, My Bondage and My Freedom reveals the author of the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, written in 1845, has grown more mature, forceful, analytical, and complex with a deepened commitment to the fight for equal rights and liberties.
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Commencer à écouterInformations sur le livre
My Bondage and My Freedom
Écrit par Frederick Douglass
Raconté par Don Hagen
Description
This is Ex-slave Frederick Douglass's second autobiography. it was written after ten years of reflection following his legal emancipation in 1846 and his break with his mentor William Lloyd Garrison catapulted Douglass into the international spotlight as the foremost spokesman for American blacks, both freed and slave. Written during his celebrated career as a newspaper editor and speaker, My Bondage and My Freedom reveals the author of the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, written in 1845, has grown more mature, forceful, analytical, and complex with a deepened commitment to the fight for equal rights and liberties.
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Outstanding! So nice to hear his own words. So many memories of thus great man’s story will live with me forever! Remarkable man
Rating: 5This is a great book, by a great American. Skeptics looking at that statement might think, well sure you think that reading his own account. Except I've found autobiographies unintentionally revealing in fascinating ways. Within the last year I read autobiographies and memoirs by Ghandi, Dian Fossey and Booker T. Washington. The first book lessened my admiration and liking, the second made me absolutely hate the women right because of her own words, and the last left me ambivalent. And in the case of others, I've become disillusioned afterwards reading other accounts of their lives. Neither is the case with Frederick Douglass--after reading this--and even, hell especially, after reading further about him, I have a new hero. I couldn't help but admire him given so much related here--particularly how, after his experience of being treated with dignity and respect in Britain, he decided to come back to America to fight to end slavery. And reading beyond this book, I learned he was a staunch supporter not just of civil rights for African Americans, but equal rights for women as well. Hardly a popular cause or common attitude back then.And simply in terms of content, this book was riveting. The 1855 introduction by James M'Cune Smith did give me momentary pause. It read, like so much 19th century literature I've encountered, as tedious, overly religious and stuffy. Once you reach Douglass' own account however, that's no longer the case. Yes, there is a formal tone that is characteristic of the age, but there wasn't one line of this entire book that wasn't fascinating; he's a master storyteller. After purchasing this book, I learned this is actually the second of three autobiographies written by Douglass. The first, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, published in 1845, is the most famous and arguably of the most influential and historically important. Yet an introduction by Brent Hayes Edwards in the edition I read makes the case for the second biography as the better, more strongly written book. Which makes sense--after all, in the decade since that first biography Douglass had spent years as editor of The North Star, which would have honed his thinking and writing.I also have read that this middle book includes the most expansive account of his time in slavery. And that account is full of insights, not simply into slavery, but how power over others corrupts victim and perpetrator alike. And I've never read a more moving account of the liberating power of literacy. I wish young people could read this early in their schooling, and read of how young Frederick heard his master talk of how reading makes a man unfit for slavery--and understand the importance of reading for setting a mind alight. The appendix contains other items of interest--the gem I think is Douglass' "Letter to his Old Master." Truly, this is a wonderful read.
Rating: 5This is one of the greatest autobiographies I've ever read. It blends a story of triumph over adversity, a retelling of a man's education, and an almost-Tocquevillean analysis of a society and how its economic foundation, slavery, seeps into every aspect of that society from religion to family even to the calendar. This should be required reading
Rating: 5