Black Writers of the Founding Era (LOA #366)

A Library of America Anthology

James G Basker, Annette Gordon-Reed, Nicole Seary

$95

Hardback

Not in-store but you can order this
How long will it take?

Availability Information

We source books from suppliers in Australia and overseas. For books we don't currently have in stock, the time it takes to get them from our suppliers can vary widely - from a few days to a few months - so we check each book with each supplier to determine the expected time it will take to be supplied to us.

We then advise you accordingly. If the time taken to get any book is too long for you, you can let us know and we will cancel or adjust your order, and refund as required.

To find out the anticipated arrival time for specific items prior to ordering, please contact us by phone or email:

Phone +61 2 9264 3111, or 1800 4 BOOKS (1800 4 26657) if outside Sydney:
option 1 Abbey's Bookshop (Crime, History, Science, Kids & more) • info@abbeys.com.au
option 2 Language Book Centre (ESL & Foreign Languages) • language@abbeys.com.au
option 3 Galaxy Bookshop (Sci-fi, Fantasy, Romance, Graphic Novels) • sf@galaxybooks.com.au

QTY:

English

The Library of America
12 December 2023

History; American War of Independence

A radical new vision of the nation's founding era and a major act of historical recovery

Featuring more than 120 writers, this groundbreaking anthology reveals the astonishing richness and diversity of Black experience in the turbulent decades of the American Revolution

A radical new vision of the nation's founding era and a major act of historical recovery

Featuring more than 120 writers, this groundbreaking anthology reveals the astonishing richness and diversity of Black experience in the turbulent decades of the American Revolution

Black Writers of the Founding Era is the most comprehensive anthology ever published of Black writing from the turbulent decades surrounding the birth of the United States. An unprecedented archive of historical sources--including more than 200 poems, letters, sermons, newspaper advertisements, slave narratives, testimonies of faith and religious conversion, criminal confessions, court transcripts, travel accounts, private journals, wills, petitions for freedom, even dreams, by over 100 authors--it is a collection that reveals the surprising richness and diversity of Black experience in the new nation.

Here are writers both enslaved and free, loyalist and patriot, female and male, northern and southern; soldiers, seamen, and veterans; painters, poets, accountants, orators, scientists, community organizers, preachers, restaurateurs and cooks, hairdressers, criminals, carpenters, and many more. Along with long-famous works like Phillis Wheatley's poems and Benjamin Banneker's astonishing mathematical and scientific puzzles are dozens of first-person narratives offering little-known Black perspectives on the events of the times, like the Boston Massacre and the death of George Washington.

From their bold and eloquent contributions to public debates about the meanings of the revolution and the values of the new nation-- writings that dramatize the many ways in which protest, activism, and community organizing have been integral to the Black American experience from the beginning--to their intimate thoughts preserved in private diaries and letters, some unseen to the present day, the words of the many writers gathered here will indelibly alter our understandings of American history.

A foreword by Annette Gordon-Reed and an introduction by James G. Basker, along with introductory headnotes and explanatory notes drawing on cutting edge scholarship, illuminate these writers' works and to situate them in their historical contexts.

A 16-page color photo insert presents portraits of some of the writers included and images of the original manuscripts, broadside, and books in which their words have been preserved.

By: James G Basker, Annette Gordon-Reed, Nicole Seary
Imprint: The Library of America
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 208mm, Width: 132mm,
Weight: 567g
ISBN: 9781598537345
ISBN 10: 1598537342
Pages: 750
Publication Date: 12 December 2023
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

James G. Basker, editor, is President of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and Richard Gilder Professor of Literary History at Barnard College, Columbia University. He has written and edited many books including, for Library of America, American Antislavery Writings- Colonial Beginnings to Emancipation (2012). Nicole Seary is Senior Editor at the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Reviews for Black Writers of the Founding Era (LOA #366): A Library of America Anthology

“Amplifies the voices of many men and women whose words and deeds shaped the America we know and cherish today. . . . Remarkable stories like these enrich and expand our understanding of our nation’s earliest days.” —Wall Street Journal