4.0 out of 5 stars Big crease on cover
Reviewed in the United States on August 22, 2022
The book was in good condition but bad a big crease on cover. Other than that it was good.
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on January 26, 2020
I’m starting this review before I’ve finished the book. I’m only like thirty pages in, really. But I feel grateful to be able to read more of what Douglass has to say. I believe that he is telling his truth and that makes for beautiful, if heartbreaking, reading. For the record (and the persistent Hypothetical Reader), it is almost 3:00 AM on January 18, 2020. It’s fitting that I’m turning to a book now. To help calm me down and get me to sleep. Douglass’ prose is complicated, so I know eventually I’ll be exhausted to sleep. And though I am generally grateful to books, this autobiography is the one I am reading at the moment, and, therefore, the one I am going to credit.
I just took 2 Tyelenol PM It’s 3:45 AM. (Does anyone find this interesting? (That’s rhetorical.)) January 28, 2020. Fredrick Douglass’s writing is too compelling and my mind is racing too quickly from the emotional evening I’ve had. I am determined to read the same paragraph again and again until I understand it without my mind wandering. It took me like 10 tries. Each time I caught myself obsessing over phrases or questions to answer or books to write. I restarted the paragraph. I reminded myself that it is alright to think about it; that doesn’t make me a person who is incapable of loving and being loved; it just means that I have thoughts and emotions; but I’m trying to sleep. And then, when I realize I’m lost in ruminations, I’d start reading the paragraph over again because my mind had wandered. Don’t worry, not all my reviews will be this minutely autobiographical. I just feel compelled to bottle lightening or whatever magic it was that left me a bawling mess of emotions earlier this (last?) evening. But then I remind myself that these are just thoughts and these sentences are just words. And that doesn’t make them good or bad--by extension, that doesn’t make me good or bad--it just means they are words. (I have to stop using the word “just”; and also stop commenting about punctuation and word usage and grammar.) But those are just thoughts, too, and just more words to think about excising later. Because right now, I’m going to smile myself to sleep and keep reading that same paragraph again and again until I drift off or understand (or at least make some conscious semblance of sense from) what is being communicated.
One last thing to mention. This should be parenthetical, but it’s not. Let’s not get caught in the weeds here. I want to mention mental health. I dedicated my last book reviews to those in my life who encouraged my reading; I dedicate this book to those who have encouraged and walked alongside me and allowed me to walk alongside of them in their mental health and (I’ll even go so far as to say) spiritual journeys. Goodnight my beloved people and words and books. I hope when I wake up, I’ll be awake.
(Sometimes it just doesn’t matter if it’s real or not, fact or fiction. I can just experience the things I’m experiencing right now: Freedom.) That’s not a concept with which Frederick Douglass or any slave was familiar. Or, I mean, Douglass was able to see through the veneer of other people’s impositions to see his (and other slaves’ and masters’) real humanity and to be bold enough to share it. His writing is honest and therefore incredible. I believe what he writes and what he is saying.
It’s January 26, now. I’ve finally been able to finish the book and make it through a hectic week. Frederick Douglass’ autobiographical narrative has been a friendly, somehow comforting, companion. Of course, history has proven that there are inaccuracies and mistakes and exaggerations for literary impact. This does not diminish from the incredible document which so clearly traces Douglass’ subjective experience through slavery to freedom.
As I read I underlined and commented in the margins. Here are a few observations and quotes:
“Slaves sing most when they are most unhappy. The songs of the slave represent the sorrows of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an aching heart is relieved by its tears” (9). I had never considered this
interpretation before.
Douglass’ is repulsed by slaveowners who profess Christianity and yet own and abuse slaves. Commenting on one of his masters, Douglass writes: “Prior to his conversion, he relied upon his own depravity to shield and sustain him in his savage barbarity; but after his conversation, he found religious sanction and support for his slaveholding cruelty” (32). This hypocrisy personally offensive to the author, though I could not easily discern from this book whether he would
identify as a Christian himself.
Chapter IX is a gut punch and ought to be required reading (fortunately for me, this is the chapter I read again and again as I tried to quell my manic thoughts and get to sleep). This chapter explores the ingrained evil that was simply viewed as convention by slave owners. Douglass verbally eviscerates his cruel masters and insightful comments on their hypocrisy and twisted character. He tells the story of terrible abuse even toward physically disabled
slaves. Also of note, Douglass is careful to assert that these are facts rather than simple feelings or opinions.
As his intellect developed, Douglass’ slavery grew more galling. After standing up to yet another abusive master, Douglass writes, “I now resolved that, however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact” (43).
Douglass uncovers a number of subtle (and not so subtle) manipulation tactics used by slave owners to keep their
slaves properly cowed and powerless. Douglass’ insight is astounding and nuanced and devastating as the truth of his firsthand experience rings out in every chapter.
The book concludes immediately after Douglass seizes his freedom, telling us nothing of his ongoing ascendance. Written in his late 20’s, one must look to Douglass’ other two autobiographies to hear more of the story. Though at times, he may be a big self-indulgent and strongly opiniated, who can blame him for taking such liberties? This book is worth reading, pondering, and feeling as the oppression of slavery is explored and the indominability of Frederick Douglass is made evident.
A-
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 31, 2022
I used this to teach my kids some history. Its a great short reference tool.
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 22, 2022
The book was in good condition but bad a big crease on cover. Other than that it was good.
4.0 out of 5 stars Big crease on cover
By Alex on August 21, 2022
The book was in good condition but bad a big crease on cover. Other than that it was good.
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 20, 2020
This book deserves a 10 star rating. It narrates with unstinting honesty the life of slavery experienced by Frederick Douglass as a child, youth and young man before he successfully fled to the North. Douglass' experiences were typical of the places and the time in which he lived. Taken from his mother at a young age, never knowing a mother's warmth and care, he lived helplessly in a brutal society, often witnessing scenes of horror as cruelty after cruelty was heaped upon the heads of black men, women and children. Floggings and other forms of physical brutality were a "normal" part of life for slaves. Overseers and masters committed violent assaults against their slaves on a daily basis. Slaves toiled from sunup to far past sundown barefoot and in rags, living on a subsistence diet of cornmeal and pork that hardly kept them from starvation, and slept on dirt floors. Eating was accomplished without use of utensils. Marriage was forbidden, families were torn apart at a whim, and slaves were altogether considered less than the beasts of the field and treated accordingly. Mr. Douglass learned to read and write, almost exclusively teaching himself, and thus became much more aware of his wretched state. His constant longing for freedom was finally satisfied after his second attempt to escape. He married and was able to establish himself profitably in the North, gradually becoming increasingly involved in the abolitionist movement. The last chapter in his book is a scathing denunciation of what passed for white Christianity in America, especially in the South where slaveholders preached from the pulpit, taught the Sunda school, prayed long and loudly, sang hymns of praise and pretended the most hypocritical piety. Meanwhile, they engaged in the most casual brutality, stealing the freedom of human beings, committing adultery by rape, flogging helpless elderly slaves, torturing any who in the slightest displeased them, apparently without conscience or remorse. The extreme violence which slaves regularly endured was perpetrated deliberately to keep them in constant terror, and to bring home the bitter results of even the slightest fault. Slaves could be and were murdered without consequence to a white killer. The witness of a hundred slaves counted for nothing. One hundred and fifty years after Emancipation, the vestiges of racial hatred and discrimination grimly persist in this country. African Americans are unjustly killed by police in numbers far exceeding their representation in the overall population, live in neighborhoods that might as well be located in the most dismal underdeveloped nations on earth, fill prisons with non- violent offenders, and receive the dregs from white society in education . Mr. Douglass would rightly be appalled at this state of affairs, a legacy of the Black Codes, Jim Crow laws, lynchings and government sanctioned segregation that existed for more than 100 years after the end of the Civil War. America has yet to come to terms with the past, correct the injustices, ensure continuing justice, and THEN move on. There's no moving on without revisiting the past.
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 16, 2022
I can't believe this wasn't (and probably still isn't) required reading in history class when I was in school. It's short enough to read in a couple of hours---but it will rock your world (if you have a heart) and shine a bright light on the horrendous situations our slaves had to endure. Douglass was self-taught under the most oppressive conditions, so it is staggering how eloquent and literate he is. He's a true humanitarian, hero, and patriot. Don't miss this.
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 29, 2022
I had a Booker Washington coin collection as a kid, but never learned much about him. I read a lot of great books in high school, but sadly this was not one of them. This should be mandatory in at least grade school. It's an easy read.
Top reviews from other countries
5.0 out of 5 stars An account of the diabolical acts of slavery.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 3, 2020
Mr Douglass opens us to the evil realm of slavery. This well written account tells of a man who went through many trials and tribulations at the hands of other men and against all odds drove him to excel to learn to read and write and to understand the ways of Jesus that enabled him to be free and to free others in every aspect of the word. He is a true liberator and has become a literary friend of mine.
2.0 out of 5 stars Misses the searing detail of My Bondage My Freedom
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 22, 2020
I'm not sure of the background to how this book was compiled but having read a fuller account in My Bondage My Freedom - the autobiography of Frederick Douglass - to me, this book misses so much of the powerful detail of the full version. It seems to summarise parts and leave out key phases of Frederick's life, particularly his early years as a young boy with his grandmother, and details of his life with Covey and Mrs Hugh Auld. At best, this book serves as a quick summary of Frederick's life, but the reader doesn't then get his eloquence and searing analysis of chattel slavery.
4.0 out of 5 stars Get the right version !
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 12, 2020
I originally purchased a different version of this excellent book, but at the beginning of chapter six, the narrative suddenly became very peculiar - as though it had been badly translated by a machine from another language. Fortunately, Amazon refunded the cost. Look for this picture (above) on the cover to ensure you have the right version.
Amazon Customer Maitou Barrett and Mike Barrett
4.0 out of 5 stars Essential reading
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 29, 2020
This is a visceral and sharply written account of one man's remarkable struggle to rise above the brutal misery of slavery and find his human dignity in the face of racism and exploitation. A moving reminder that nearly 200 years later the struggle is not over.
5.0 out of 5 stars Heart-wrenching Literary genius
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on March 3, 2019
This book is so eloquently written but deals with such a heart-rending subject. Hard to put down until finished.
Genius