Harriet Jacobs' Autobiography: A Journey Through the Struggles of Slavery

Shelby: It was ok.

Canada on Nov 25, 2023

Kamanzi Hyve: Highly recommend this book. I bought this book as a gift for my coworker, and the feedback was great.

United States on Nov 15, 2023

Dissatisfied: Great history read.

United States on Nov 15, 2023

Tetris: After awhile, people forget the day to day typical redundant events, let alone major events of the past like slavery.. What is Needed sometimes is clarity of major social events that show how we where shaped into society today. One thought to many grieving questions ( like the trickling down of the inferiority complex ) could be answered by reading this book..Also, Agitate, Agitate, Agitate shows why it was a needed birth of expression ( the only tool that can be transcended to the next generation ) that was needed in our past, and today going into our future and beyond. Ignorance never dies….

United States on Sep 20, 2023

Isabelle: Just a warning for any university students, I got this copy for a module I’m taking. The story itself is correct and perfectly fine however it doesn’t have enough details to be able to reference it correctly! If you’re using it for non-academic purposes it’ll be fine :)

United Kingdom on Sep 20, 2023

Alfred Richardson: Very early in her writing, Harriet Ann Jacob showed empathy for others like herself who suffered as slaves. Her reason for writing was to bring awareness of the plight of slaves in the hopes that one day slavery would be abolished. She underscores forcefully the incompatibility of the institution of slavery and Christianity.

Jacob's book throws light on a different side of slavery. Her family, although slaves, lived in relative comfort compared with those who worked in the field. But this situation did not spare them from being treated as less than human. It did not shield them from witnessing extreme cruelty. For this reason Harriet was able to commiserate with her fellow slaves who worked in the field. It is why, after successfully fleeing to freedom, she was determined to work for the abolition of slavery.

Throughout her memoir she makes a special plea for women. While she documents a panoramic view of slavery, her main focus has been the "...two millions of women at the South" suffering painfully under the bondage of slavery. Her effort then is an important historical work because it gives a voice to these voiceless female slaves. This voice is very much...

United States on Jun 18, 2023

Kindle-Kunde: One should think that a high-quality academic publisher that makes the laudable decision to include page numbers in an e-book would manage to
1) also number the introduction and endnote pages, not just the main text (as would happen in the print edition)
2) make the page numbers in the e-book the same as the ones in the print text, which makes it more user-friendly (one could cite the e-book and enable users of the print version to locate quotes easily, and vice versa).
None of these things is the case with this edition. What is the point of page numbers in e-books at all, unless they follow the print edition? For e-book-only citations one might as well use "position" numbers. Other publishers manage page numbers in e-books fine. Why not this one? I bought the e-version precisely because it seemed it DID have page numbers and was thus usable is classes where others used the print edition. Otherwise I would have bought the print edition straight away. Now I might have to buy it (in print) a second time. VERY DISAPPOINTING AND UNPROFESSIONAL.

Germany on May 03, 2023

Jim Dale: This is a fantastic book. I like a story written with such skill that you become immersed in the characters and you read on as if you are there. Here we have that in spades working down through the generations of the family. Hollywood has given all of us a picture of the indignity and cruelty of the slave owners and traders towards the slaves, so that part of the story isn't new to the reader. What I found new to me was the inner feelings of hopelessness that these unfortunate people felt. Anyone who has been subjected to the intense military training in an elite regiment will know how it feels to be bullied all hours day and night without any means to retaliate. What we had though was an end point, we knew how long the training would go on for and also our release date from the forces. The unfortunate slaves had no end point to look forward to, they had no way out, no light at the end of the tunnel. We are made aware in the modern world how cruel humans can become when they have total control over someone, e.g. prisoners of war etc. It is easy to become like animals in our behaviour. Have we made progress towards civilisation in the past 100 years? Do we still have the capacity...

United Kingdom on Mar 21, 2012

John Umland: February is Black History Month in the United States, which I want to use to read the accounts of those whose experience so different from mine. Many historical texts are now freely available and are starting to fill up my Kindle. This story broke my heart as I read it, and I encourage all Americans to read the accounts, like this, of our own practice of inhumanity. While I get justifiably upset when I read the wicked inhumanity of the Japanese, I tend to forget that their behavior was not unique to their culture. We Americans have committed many inhumane horrors throughout our history, especially in our slave-owning period. Anyone who refers to the American Civil War as the War of Northern Aggression have no idea of the degree wickedness the Confederacy was trying to protect. This account by escaped slave Harriet Ann Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Written by Herself (1861) should be enough for any modern defender of the Confederacy to be ashamed. The book is long, thorough and demands a response from us her readers. What will we do when presented with these accounts? I will quote abundantly, to a fault, from this book so that her point is loud and clear, slavery...

United States on Feb 12, 2012

Aurora: Although initially I found the style to be childlike and somewhat unsophisticated that was soon forgotten and subsumed by the content of the book. There is something about it which simultaneously fascinates and appals the reader. At times I had to put it down as I considered the fact that it is a true and contemporaneous account of the dreadful life endured by slaves. As a mother it was hard to read of the way in which the children of slaves were removed from their parents whether for profit or as a punishment for even minor, or imagined transgressions, just so that the slave owners could demonstrate their power over their "property". It was hard to imagine a man procreating with his female slaves just to increase his stock in the way described. We have always been aware of, and condemned, the evils of slavery but this book makes the reader aware of it in new ways through the, sometimes casual, cruelty of the slave owners and traders, be it emotional or physical, and the absolute denial of humanity in slaves who are often told that they are not human and are treated in the most appalling ways. This book makes clear that not all the cruelties inflicted on slaves are physical,...

United Kingdom on May 04, 2011