Sojourner Truth: A Life, a Symbol
NELL IRVIN PAINTER
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12 reviews (1996) (384p)Visit this book's Amazon.com page >>
| Book Description |
| Sojourner Truth--ex-slave and fiery abolitionist of the mid-nineteenth century, a figure of imposing physique, riveting preacher, and spellbinding singer who dazzled listeners with her wit and originality. Straight-talking and unsentimental, Truth became an early national symbol for strong black women--indeed, for all strong women. Like Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass, she is regarded as a radical of immense and enduring influence; yet, unlike them, what is remembered of her consists more of myth than of personality. Now in a masterful blend of scholarship and sympathetic understanding, eminent black historian Nell Irvin Painter goes beyond the myths, words, and photographs to uncover the life of a complex woman who was born into slavery and died a legend. |
| Amazon.com Review |
| Though she was born into slavery and subjected to physical and sexual abuse by her owners, Sojourner Truth, who eventually fled the South for the promise of the North, came to represent the power of individual strength and perseverance. She championed the disadvantaged--black in the South, women in the North--yet spent much of her free life with middle-class whites, who supported her, yet never failed to remind her that she was a second class citizen. Slowly, but surely, Sojourner climbed from beneath the weight of slavery, secured respect for herself, and utilized the distinction of her race to become not only a symbol for black women, but for the feminist movement as a whole. |
| Nell Irvin Painter Award Stats |
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| *Major Prize = Pulitzer Prize, National Book Critics Circle Award, National Book Award, Man Booker Prize, and PEN/Faulkner Award |
