Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave

by Frederick Douglass, Henry Louis Gates Jr. (Introduction)

Overview

Published in the bicentenary year of Frederick Douglass’s birth and in a Black Lives Matter era, this 2018 anniversary edition of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, presents new research into his life as an activist and as an author. As a revolutionary reformer who traveled in Scotland, Ireland, England, and Wales as well as the US, Douglass published many foreign language editions of his Narrative. While there have been many Douglasses over the decades and even centuries, the Frederick Douglass we need now is no iconic, mythic or legendary self-made man but a fallible, mortal, and human individual: a husband, father, brother, and son. His rallying cry lives on to inspire today’s activism: “Agitate! Agitate! Agitate!”

Recognizing that Douglass was bought and sold on the northern abolitionist podium no less than on the southern auction block, this edition introduces readers to Douglass’s multiple declarations of independence. Douglass’s Narrative appears alongside his private correspondence as well as his early speeches and writings in which he relied on powerful language to do justice to the “grim horrors of slavery.” This volume also traces the activism and authorship of Frederick Douglass not in isolation but in the context of the reformist work of his wife, Anna Murray, and his daughters and sons.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780440222286
Publisher:	Random House Publishing Group
Publication date:	01/28/1997
Edition description:	Anniversary
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	4.40(w) x 6.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Celeste-Marie Bernier is Professor of Black Studies at the University of Edinburgh.

Hometown:

Tuckahoe, Maryland

Date of Birth:

1818

Date of Death:

February 20, 1895

Place of Death:

Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

Appendix A: European Editions

1. Title Page and Frontispiece, Dublin: Webb and Chapman, 1845
2. Preface, Dublin: Webb and Chapman, 1845
3. Title Page and Frontispiece, Dublin: 2nd Dublin Edition, Webb and Chapman, 1846
4. Title Page and Frontispiece, Leeds: Third English Edition, Joseph Barker, 1846
5. Title Page and Frontispiece, Dutch translation: Levensverhaal van Frederick Douglass, een’ gewezen slaaf (door hem zelven geschreven), Ut het Engelsch Rotterdam: H. A. Kramers, 1846
6. Title Page, French translation: Vie de Frederic Douglass, esclave americain, ecrite par lui-meme, traduite de l’anglaise, par S.K. Parkes, Paris: Pagnerre, 1848

Appendix B: Correspondence

1. Frederick Douglass to Richard D. Webb, Belfast, December 6, 1845
2. Frederick Douglass to Richard D. Webb, Belfast, December 24, 1845
3. Frederick Douglass to Richard D. Webb, Perth, Scotland, January 20, 1846
4. Frederick Douglass to Richard D. Webb, Dundee, Scotland, February, 10, 1846
5. Frederick Douglass to Maria Weston Chapman, Kilmarnock, Scotland, March 29, 1846
6. Frederick Douglass to Richard D. Webb, Glasgow, April 16, 1846
7. Frederick Douglass to William Lloyd Garrison, Glasgow, Scotland, April 16, 1846
8. Frederick Douglass to Richard D. Webb, Glasgow, Scotland, April 25, 1846

Appendix C: Speeches and Writings

1. “I Have Come to Tell you Something About Slavery: An Address delivered in Lynn Massachusetts in October 1841.” Pennsylvania Freeman, October 20, 1841
2. “Speech of Frederic [sic] Douglass, A Fugitive Slave,” National Anti-Slavery Standard, December 23, 1841
3. “I Stand Here a Slave: An Address Delivered in Boston, Massachusetts, on 28 January 1842.” Liberator, February 4 and 18, 1842
4. “The Antislavery Movement: The Slave’s Only Earthly Hope: An Address Delivered in New York, New York, on 9 May 1843.” National Antislavery Standard May 18, 1843
5. Nathaniel P. Rogers, “Your Religion Justifies our Tyrants, and You are Yourselves Our Enslavers,” Herald of Freedom, February 16, 1844
6. “I Will Venture to Say a Word on Slavery: An Address Delivered in New York new York on 6 May 1845.” National Anti-Slavery Standard, May 22, 1845
7. “Frederick Douglass in behalf of George Latimer Lynn Massachusetts, November 8, 1842.” Liberator, November 18, 1842
8. “No Union with Slaveholders: An Address Delivered in Boston, Massachusetts: 28 May 1844.” National Antislavery Standard, July 25, 1844
9. “The Black Man Was No Less a Man Because of His Color: An Address Delivered in Norristown, Pennsylvania: 12 August 1844.” Pennsylvania Freeman, August 22, 1844
10. “Slavery and the Annexation of Texas to the United States.” Liberator, December 12, 1845
11. “The Folly Of Our Opponents.” The Liberty Bell, Boston, 1845
12. “To My Old Master,” North Star, September 8, 1848
13. Frederick Douglass To Harriet Tubman, Rochester, August 29, 1868

Appendix D: Family

1. Anna Murray Douglass Portrait, n.d.
2. Rosetta Douglass Sprague Portrait, n.d.
3. Lewis Henry Douglass Portrait, n.d.
4. Frederick Douglass Jr. Portrait, n.d.
5. Charles Remond Douglass Portrait, n.d.
6. Rosetta Douglass to Frederick Douglass, Albany, October 20, 1846
7. Rosetta Douglass to Frederick Douglass, Albany, October 23, 1846
8. Annie Douglass to Frederick Douglass, Rochester, December 7, 1859
9. Frederick Douglass to Harriet Bailey/ Ruth Cox, May 16, 1846
10. Frederick Douglass to Harriet Bailey/ Ruth Cox, July 17, 1846
11. Frederick Douglass to Harriet Bailey/ Ruth Cox, August 18, 1846
12. Frederick Douglass to Harriet Bailey/ Ruth Cox, January 31, 1847
13. Jan Marsh Parker, “Reminiscences of Frederick Douglass,” April 6, 1895
14. Rosetta Douglass Sprague, “My Mother as I Recall Her,” May 10, 1900
15. Lewis Henry Douglass, Undated and untitled handwritten statement, c.1905