Eliza Potter.

Exprience d'un salon de coiffure dans High

Life.
"\"\\\"\\\\\\\"Eliza Potter. A Hairdresser's Experience in High Life. Ed.Xiomara Santamarina. Chapel
Hill: U of North Carolina P, 2009. 264 pp.$25.00.\\\\\\\\nEds. DoVeanna S. Fulton Minor and Reginald
H. Pitts. Speaking Lives, Authoring Texts: Three African American Women's Oral Slave Narratives.
Albany: SUNY P, 2010. 193 pp. $80.00 cloth\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/$29.95 paper. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nAfrican
Americanists coming of academic age in the last thirty years have witnessed a period of literary
recovery and critical production unsurpassed in its breadth and richness. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s
Schomburg Library of Nineteenth-Century Black Women Writers and Richard Yarborough's seminal
Library of Black Literature series have helped to repopulate early African American literature,
gender and cultural studies into fields that are now diverse and bustling areas of intellectual
inquiry. The archival discoveries and scholarship of academics such as Frances Smith Foster, Jean
Fagan Yellin, Carla Peterson, Elizabeth McHenry, and Lois Brown have punctuated the phoenix-like
rise of nineteenth-century black women's literary culture as a field of study. This work has given
wing to exciting new scholarship that sometimes flies in the crosswinds of received understandings
of literacy, geography and reform that have, until recently, characterized nineteenth-century
African American literary history. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nThe books reviewed here highlight texts and critical
currents that challenge conventional understandings of antebellum African American women's
autobiography. They also represent some of the best of the editorial work that distinguishes the
scholarship of the past several decades. Antebellum black autobiography has largely
been associated with self-emancipated people who escaped the South and transformed themselves
into authors and activists. For this reason, the texts reprinted in these two editions have puzzled the
few students of antebellum race relations, black literature, and American slavery who have
encountered them. Many of these works are set outside of the ideological and geographical borders
that map conventional conceptualizations of the antebellum period; some are oral narratives that
claim the agency, authority and authorship most often associated with literacy's relationship to
freedom. As such, these are life stories, to borrow from Nell Irvin Painter, that until now have
rested uneasily alongside the corpus of American slave narratives and the critical paradigms that
have emerged to interpret them (Painter vii). \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nThe superb introductions and
additional information these neweditions provide promise to bring understudied texts--and the
questionsthey pose--to the critical foreground. When grouped together withPainter's edition of
Sojourner Truth's narratives and RGabrielle Foreman and Reginald Pitts's edition of Harriet
E.Wilson's Our Nig, for example, these narratives form a substantialbody of writing that, as
Santamarina puts it, challenges \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"many ofour ideas about nineteenth-century African
American history andliterature\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (xi). Together, as Fulton claims, they highlight
the\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"multiplicity of African American lives and experiences as well asthe manifold
rhetorical styles\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" black women employ (3). They cannow be more productively paired,
taught and studied with other lesser-and well-known texts, and will surely yield exciting new
scholarshipthat addresses not only the narratives themselves but also the broaderfield-shifting
questions they raise.\\\\\\\\nThe author and subject of Eliza Potter's A Hairdresser's Experience in
High Life (1859) styles herself as a social\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/society critic and free entrepreneur. Both living
outside of and challenging the North-South divide, she travels from Cincinnati overseas to France
and Great Britain and also to the South to work. Potter's narrative is part travel narrative, part
gossip column. As in any mixed family, it finds itself claiming kin with folks--or in this case, genres-that resemble each other only if one looks closely. Her travel narrative might productively be read
in concert with testimonies by and scholarship on peripatetic black sailors, nursemaids and
preachers. Potter joins such figures as Martin Delany, William and Ellen Craft, Nancy Prince,
William Wells Brown, Harriet Jacobs, Zilpha Elaw, and Sarah Remond in laying claim to

transnational explorations we are just beginning to associate with a politics of mobility,

black cosmopolitanism, and literary culture. Of course, many of these authors concerned
themselves \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"with the dynamics of race and U.S. racial domination\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (Santamarina
xii). Potter disturbs this trend, instead focusing \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"on her successful work history and the
mobility that work offered\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (xii). She thus offers a different lens through which to view
African American class, labor and mobility. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nAs its editor points out, Eliza Potter's
autobiography delighted Cincinnati's gossip columnists at the time of its first appearance. Potter's
revelations, introduced with such intimacy-evoking clauses as: \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"I could neither find paper
nor time to tell you half the things as come under my notice\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (94), may puzzle academic
readers conditioned to look for a social critique delivered with a sharper political edge. But an
emphasis on fashion, clothes and hair in Potter's era anticipates what appears in some columns of
important late-century newspapers such as the Woman's Era, the official organ of the black
women's Club movement. Though some contemporary readers have focused on (and have come to
expect) a protest rhetoric that responds to enslavement, disenfranchisement, and Jim Crow, African
American authors and newspapers display a wide variety of other interests. Strident critiques of
racial injustice often appear side-by-side with columns addressing international affairs,
temperance, elocution, and the fine details of fashion. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nAs recent scholars
building on the work of Claudia Tate and AnnduCille have taken pains to explain, domestic concerns
can sitcomfortably beside traditional forms of political expression, and areoften used to express
critique and appropriation. In High Life,Santamarina points out that the social authority Potter
claims inrelationship to her white clientele \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"subverts racial and classhierarchies\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"
(xxi) even as it affirms them. Ultimately, Santamarinaargues, \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"Potter establishes her
authority as a social critic byendorsing, rather than opposing, a social structure based
onauthority\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (xxi). Still, High Life's fascination with thevalues of an economic order that
affirms elite social power does nottemper an insurgency that muddies white women's often
sanitizedclass and gendered entitlements. \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"My avocation calls me into theupper classes of
society,\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" Potter announces as she opens, \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"andthere reign as many elements of
misery as the world can produce\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"(3). \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"No one need go into alleys to hunt up
wretchedness,\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" shegoes on, \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"they can find it in perfection among the rich
andfashionable\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (3). When one links this strand of High Life to AmeliaJohnson's racially
indeterminate temperance novel Clarence andCorrine (1890), for example, one can trace the razorsharp critique ofwhite familial dysfunction that runs through black women's textsthat are often
dismissed as irrelevant because they don't highlightreform in ways that readers have been trained to
recognize.\\\\\\\\nThe critical importance of Santamarina's scholarship on class, work, and labor in
nineteenth-century black writing is underscored by a 2010 Center for Community Economic
Development study (\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"Women of Color, Wealth, and America's Future\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\")
that illustrates the staying power of economic concerns in black women's lives. In this century, in
our time, the median net worth of single white women ages 36-49 is $42,600; yet, at the height of
our working years, single women of color in the same age group have a median wealth of just $5.00
(yes, five dollars). Academic work that explores all aspects of black women's (historically
undervalued or historically overlooked) labor is crucial to an understanding of our economic
and social pasts and presents. Like her Belabored Professions: Autobiography and Black Women's
Labor, this edition by Santamarina is an important contribution. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nConsidering the
ground-breaking advances in biographical recovery (magisterial biographies of Harriet Jacobs and
Pauline Hopkins, and new work on Lucy Terry and Harriet Wilson come to mind), the only area
in which this volume leaves readers wanting more is the story of Potter's life beyond the pages the
book covers. Broad swathes of Potter's story are still missing, and recent collaborations
and conversations among literary historians, genealogists, and independent scholars have proven
so fruitful that one wishes that this emerging community had come together to uncover more about
Eliza Potter. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nDoVeanna Fulton and Reginald Pitts's Speaking Lives, Authoring Texts:
Three African American Women's Oral Slave Narratives benefits from such a collaboration between

accomplished critic and noted genealogist. Each of the three texts included in Speaking Lives is
introduced by a chronology that belies in its order and simplicity the labor that made it possible.
The edition includes three oral narratives--Louisa Picquet, The Octoroon: A Tale of Southern Life
(1861), The Story of Mattie J. Jackson (1866) and Sylvia Dubois (Now 116 Years Old), A Biography of
the Slave Who Whipped Her Mistress and Gained her Freedom (1883)--which were previously
published only in separate volumes. As he and his coeditor did in their collaborative work on
Harriet Wilson, Reginald Pitts mines newspapers, probate, census, marriage, pension, and death
records, resurrecting and stringing together details that facilitate historically informed
interpretations. Pitts has resuscitated Louisa Picquet's later life, confirming the activism of the
church in which she was involved, and in her husband's Civil War pension records, evidence of her
literacy. Likewise, the research featured in Speaking Lives, Authoring Texts allows one of the few
black (and Native American) amanuenses, Dr. Lucy Schuyler Thompson, to come to life as an
antislavery activist, entrepreneur, and healer, as it also explains what happened to Mattie Jackson
after her narrative's end. In sharp contrast to a previous edition of the Dubois narrative, Fulton and
Pitts offer a cogent and compelling introduction and framework. They gather previously
scattered but relatively copious information about Dubois and present the text in both standardized
English and in the original phonetic spelling of the first edition (a product of the spelling reform
movement meant to preserve the sound of the spoken English). In doing so, they provide for the
first time a memorable and important text that can be productively taught in history, literary,
women's studies, linguistics, and folklore and anthropology courses. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nThe texts
included in Speaking laves, Authoring Texts not only display the importance of as-told-to narratives,
but also further complicate accepted geographical conceptions of enslavement and freedom, while
affirming the centrality of maternal relations in narratives of slavery. Though all three women were
enslaved, none of them followed a standard South-to-North, slavery-to-freedom trajectory. Jackson
and her family were held as property in Missouri; Dubois lived in New Jersey both as a bondwoman
and as a free woman. Though the editor of the Picquet narrative focuses on her Southern
experiences, the story of Picquet's efforts to redeem her mother from Texas is situated in her tours
of the North and the Midwest, where she traveled and spoke to raise the money that ultimately
reunited them. Her volume was published in Cincinnati, just two years after Potter's narrative
delighted the gossip columnists of the Queen City they shared. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nSpeaking Lives,
Authoring Texts troubles understandings of both literacy and authorship. Fulton refuses a singular
valorization of the narrative \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"written by herself,\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" a concentration on the
mastery of writing which \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"obscures and dismisses the significance of oral narratives as
texts authored by their narrators\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (3; emphasis in original). Formal literacy, as other
critics have suggested, should take its place beside, rather than above, the cultural and
political literacies that nineteenth-century African American women's texts and literary
organizations so often foregrounded. Mattie Jackson's narrative makes this case in the strongest
terms. She continually stresses her and her mother's reading powers--the information and pleasure
they get from newspapers and their interpretative audacity as they do so--as reasons for their
owners' viciousness. Mattie bends a switch (laid out by her mistress) awaiting both
Mattie's master's return and her own back. She testifies that, \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"as I was not pleased with
the idea of a whipping, I bent the switch in the shape of a W, which is the first letter of his
name\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (110). Mattie not only substitutes the initial of her own name with his and avoids
the whipping, but she also then narrates that it is her master rather than she who ultimately
receives a hundred lashes at the hands of a Union general who discovers through Mattie that her
master has disobeyed Union orders. By converting her figurative inversion into the physical
realm, this scene punctuates its subject's formal and political mastery of language, letters, and
politics, even as its form of an as-told-to narrative suggests a different story. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nSylvia
Dubois (Now 116 Years Old), A Biography of the Slave Who Whipped Her Mistress and Gained her
Freedom (1883) is a postbellum narrative that stresses Dubois's agency and oral power.
Partly because the original editor's experiment with phonetic spelling \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"stands between

Dubois and the reader\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" (26), it is the least studied of the three texts Fulton and Pitts have
included--though their presentation of this lively narrative provides a likely remedy. Like the others,
the Dubois biography was originally republished in the Schomburg Library of Nineteenth-Century
Black Women Writers. The 1988 introduction was driven by an emphasis on the text's factual
inconsistencies and on the accuracy of Dubois's age; its focus overshadowed Dubois's highly
original voice, her affirmation of her bodily strength and size, and her willingness to take on, both
physically and verbally, those who challenged her authority or her freedom. Indeed, Dubois's text
flies in the face of the paradigms through which we have come to characterize gender and
respectability in the late nineteenth century. Within her narrative, she not only \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"whips
her mistress,\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" she then goes on to own a bawdy tavern, to dance with abandon, to swear
with real gusto and to speak her own mind. With its focus on a woman's bodily strength and oral
power on the one hand, and on regional ethnography, ethnographers, memory, and
straightforward and humorous expression on the other, it teaches beautifully. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nIn her
previous work, Speaking Power: Black Feminist Orality in Women's Narratives of Slavery, as in
Speaking Lives, Authoring Texts, Fulton links discursive mastery and authorship to testimony
and to scenes of inception rather than solely to the latter stages of production (that is, to
publishing), and distribution, in which authors such as Harriet Jacobs, Harriet Wilson, and Frances
E. W. Harper were so involved. As she groups together the texts featured in this edition and makes
a case for the importance of oral narratives, Fulton also offers useful disaggregations, pointing out
the very different editorial (or coauthoring) relationships and power dynamics at work in the
production of oral narratives. These range from Picquet's relationship with her editor, the Rev.
Hiram Mattison (in which he is so removed from his subject that he finds out indirectly, from an
announcement she has published in a local paper, that she has already achieved her mother's
freedom, the goal that motivated the text), to Mattie Jackson's familial, ongoing and intimate
connection to her editor, Dr. Thompson, to the more regional and linguistic interests that motivate
Sylvia Dubois's editor. This edition glosses these different and differential power relations as well as
it glosses the scenes of contestation, control, and collaboration
between \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"author\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" and \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"amanuensis.\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" Such work calls for
the collaborative research and recovery this edition models, and for new critical vocabularies to
capture such coauthorial acts. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nFulton and Pitts's as well as
Santamarina's complementary editions, offer a great deal to the fields of nineteenth-century
historical, African American, autobiographical, and gender studies. Recovery and editorial work are
labors of love. Though they go largely unrewarded in the metrics of the academy, the resurrection
of so many buried and disremembered books and lives has been accomplished through complex
coauthorial acts across time and place. Speaking Lives, Authoring Texts and A
Hairdresser's Experience in High Life build upon and honor this editorial tradition. As scholars
teach these texts and write about them, we will thank the editors for bringing these extraordinary
voices, texts, and lives to our attention, to our classrooms, and to our research and
writing. \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\nReviewed by P. Gabrielle Foreman, University of Delaware \\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\"\\\"\"