Books with author Harriet A. Jacobs

Published in 1861, “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl” was one of the first personal narratives by a slave and one of the few written by a woman. Jacobs (1813-97) was a slave in North Carolina and suffered terribly, along with her family, at the hands of a ruthless owner. She made several failed attempts to escape before successfully making her way North, though it took years of hiding and slow progress. Eventually, she was reunited with her children. For all biography and history collections. "Slavery is terrible for men, but it is far more terrible for women," Harriet Jacobs wrote in 1861. At that time she was an escaped slave living in the north, but the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 meant that she could no longer consider being in the northern states a guarantee of freedom or safety. Her book is an eloquent recital of the suffering that is slavery. Families broken apart; promises of freedom made but never kept; whippings, beatings, and burnings; masters selling their own children - all are recounted with precise detail and a blazing indignation. Harriet Jacobs' master started pursuing her when she was fifteen; in disgust she continually refused and avoided him. Her first attempt at revenge and escape failed: she became the lover of a local unmarried white man and had several children, but even then her master refused to sell her. Finally, in desperation, she ran away and hid in an uninsulated garret, three feet high at its tallest point with almost no air or light. She stayed there for seven years, enduring cold, heat, and a crippling lack of movement, always hoping to catch a glimpse of her children through a crack in the walls as they walked by on the road below her. At last she had a chance to escape to the North. Her story is a remarkable testimony to her strength and courage, and an unrelenting attack upon the institution of slavery.

Harriet Jacobs was not an ordinary slave girl, and her autobiography is not an ordinary account of the miseries of slavery. She was a slave who triumphed not only by luck but by careful planning and daring deceit. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, the most important and most widely read female slave narrative, presents the subtle humiliations in addition to the simple brutality of slave life, especially for enslaved women and children. This gripping account, first published under the pseudonym Linda Brent, skilfully employs rhetorical and narrative devices to create a gripping and evocative story. Indeed, until Jean Yellin’s over work a century later, it was regarded as a work of fiction.

'Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl' by Harriet Ann Jacobs eBook Report:This eBook of 'Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl' by Harriet Ann Jacobs has been tested on below parameters across ALL devices (including Kindle, Android, iBook, Cloud Readers etc.). It works 100% perfectly as required.SUCCESSFUL TESTS RESULTS ACROSS ALL DEVICES:1) Active Footnotes & Endnotes with One-Click navigation.2) Active Table of Contents.3) Word Wise – Enabled.4) Illustrations & Tables (if any) are available with ZOOM feature on double-click.5) Formatted for Faster Reading experience with easy Font & Page adjustments. NOTE: This is an unabridged content. Spelling errors or Typos (if any) have been corrected as per Amazon standards. About “Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl” by 'Harriet Ann Jacobs' *The true story of an individual's struggle for self-identity, self-preservation, and freedom, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl remains among the few extant slave narratives written by a woman. This autobiographical account chronicles the remarkable odyssey of Harriet Jacobs (1813–1897) whose dauntless spirit and faith carried her from a life of servitude and degradation in North Carolina to liberty and reunion with her children in the North.Written and published in 1861 after Jacobs' harrowing escape from a vile and predatory master, the memoir delivers a powerful and unflinching portrayal of the abuses and hypocrisy of the master-slave relationship. Jacobs writes frankly of the horrors she suffered as a slave, her eventual escape after several unsuccessful attempts, and her seven years in self-imposed exile, hiding in a coffin-like "garret" attached to her grandmother's porch.A rare firsthand account of a courageous woman's determination and endurance, this inspirational story also represents a valuable historical record of the continuing battle for freedom and the preservation of family.* - This content has been taken from GoodReads.com.

"Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl", Harriet Jacobs' autobiography, is the story of a woman who overcomes the odds to save her family is similar. Under the pseudonym Linda Brent, Jacobs details her life as a woman enslaved at the height of the abolitionist movement.As the narrative opens, Linda Brent recounts the "unusually fortunate circumstances" of her early childhood before she realized she was a slave. Linda's father is a carpenter who — because of his extraordinary skills — is granted many of the privileges of a free man. The chapter introduces Linda's mother, her brother William, and her Uncle Benjamin, who is sold at age ten. Linda also introduces her maternal grandmother (referred to as Aunt Martha by the white community), a strong-willed, resourceful woman who establishes a bakery to earn money to buy her children's freedom. She manages to earn $300, which she loans to her mistress, who never repays her.When Linda is six years old, her mother dies. When she is 12, her mistress dies, and Linda is sold to the five-year-old daughter of her mistress' sister...

The unflinching nineteenth-century autobiography that broke the silence on the psychosexual exploitation of Black women—with an introduction by Tiya Miles, recipient of a MacArthur “genius” grant“[A] crowning achievement . . . [Jacobs] remodeled the forms of the black slave narrative and the white female sentimental novel to create a new literary form—a narrative at once black and female.” —Henry Louis Gates, Jr., The New York Times In clear and unshrinking prose, Harriet Jacobs—writing under the pseudonym Linda Brent—relates the story of her girlhood and adolescence as a slave in North Carolina and her eventual escape: a bildungsroman set in the complex terrain of a chauvinist, white supremacist society. Resolutely addressing women readers, rather than men, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl seeks to make white women understand how the threat of sexual violence shapes the lives of enslaved Black women and children. Equal parts brave and searing, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is a triumph of American literature.The Modern Library Torchbearers series features women who wrote on their own terms, with boldness, creativity, and a spirit of resistance.AMERICAN INDIAN STORIES • THE AWAKENING • THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY • THE HEADS OF CERBERUS • LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET • LOVE, ANGER, MADNESS • PASSING • THE RETURN OF THE SOLDIER • THERE IS CONFUSION • THE TRANSFORMATION OF PHILIP JETTAN • VILLETTE

The unflinching nineteenth-century autobiography that broke the silence on the psychosexual exploitation of Black women—with an introduction by Tiya Miles, recipient of a MacArthur “genius” grant“[A] crowning achievement . . . [Jacobs] remodeled the forms of the black slave narrative and the white female sentimental novel to create a new literary form—a narrative at once black and female.” —Henry Louis Gates, Jr., The New York Times In clear and unshrinking prose, Harriet Jacobs—writing under the pseudonym Linda Brent—relates the story of her girlhood and adolescence as a slave in North Carolina and her eventual escape: a bildungsroman set in the complex terrain of a chauvinist, white supremacist society. Resolutely addressing women readers, rather than men, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl seeks to make white women understand how the threat of sexual violence shapes the lives of enslaved Black women and children. Equal parts brave and searing, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is a triumph of American literature.The Modern Library Torchbearers series features women who wrote on their own terms, with boldness, creativity, and a spirit of resistance.AMERICAN INDIAN STORIES • THE AWAKENING • THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY • THE HEADS OF CERBERUS • LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET • LOVE, ANGER, MADNESS • PASSING • THE RETURN OF THE SOLDIER • THERE IS CONFUSION • THE TRANSFORMATION OF PHILIP JETTAN • VILLETTE

The unflinching nineteenth-century autobiography that broke the silence on the psychosexual exploitation of Black women—with an introduction by Tiya Miles, recipient of a MacArthur “genius” grant“[A] crowning achievement . . . [Jacobs] remodeled the forms of the black slave narrative and the white female sentimental novel to create a new literary form—a narrative at once black and female.” —Henry Louis Gates, Jr., The New York Times In clear and unshrinking prose, Harriet Jacobs—writing under the pseudonym Linda Brent—relates the story of her girlhood and adolescence as a slave in North Carolina and her eventual escape: a bildungsroman set in the complex terrain of a chauvinist, white supremacist society. Resolutely addressing women readers, rather than men, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl seeks to make white women understand how the threat of sexual violence shapes the lives of enslaved Black women and children. Equal parts brave and searing, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is a triumph of American literature.The Modern Library Torchbearers series features women who wrote on their own terms, with boldness, creativity, and a spirit of resistance.AMERICAN INDIAN STORIES • THE AWAKENING • THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY • THE HEADS OF CERBERUS • LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET • LOVE, ANGER, MADNESS • PASSING • THE RETURN OF THE SOLDIER • THERE IS CONFUSION • THE TRANSFORMATION OF PHILIP JETTAN • VILLETTE

This eBook edition of "Harriet Jacobs: Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" has been formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices."Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" is an autobiography by a young mother and fugitive slave Harriet Ann Jacobs. Jacobs contributed to the genre of slave narrative by using the techniques of sentimental novels "to address race and gender issues." She explores the struggles and sexual abuse that female slaves faced on plantations as well as their efforts to practice motherhood and protect their children when their children might be sold away. Harriet Ann Jacobs (1813 – 1897) was an African-American writer who escaped from slavery and was later freed. She became an abolitionist speaker and reformer.

Harriet A. Jacobs’s Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself is the most important narrative written by a former female slave in antebellum America. Published in 1861 and under the penname of Linda Brent, the book is a powerful indictment on black women’s exploitation in America. “Slavery is terrible for men, but it is far more terrible for women”, declares Jacobs before describing the degradation of slavery and the sexual oppression she experienced as a black woman.