Frederick Douglass

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

"Frederick Douglass is a singular, towering figure of American history. The entire legacy of black intellectual thought and civil rights activism flows in some way through Douglass, from W. E. B. DuBois to Booker T. Washington, to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., to President Barack Obama himself." - The New York Times Frederick Douglass's autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave, is widely regarded as a classic of American nineteenth-century history, of African-American studies, and of literature. In 1845, just seven years after his escape from slavery, the young Douglass published this powerful account of his life as a slave and his triumph over oppression. The book, which marked the beginning of Douglass's career as an impassioned writer, journalist, and orator for the abolitionist cause, reveals the terrors he faced as a slave, the brutalities of his owners and overseers, and his harrowing escape to the North. "None so dramatically as Douglass integrated both the horror and the great quest of the African-American experience into the deep stream of American autobiography. He advanced and extended that tradition and is rightfully designated one of its greatest practitioners."-John W. Blassingame "The most celebrated orator of his day" - The New Yorker "Beyond its illuminating historical record, Narrative offers a poignant reflection on the psychological agony of emerging from slavery." - The Washington Post