LibGuides: Biography: Books and Reference Material

eBooks

American Slave Narratives
"Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938 contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives were collected in the 1930s as part of the Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and assembled and microfilmed in 1941 as the seventeen-volume Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves. This online collection is a joint presentation of the Manuscript and Prints and Photographs Divisions of the Library of Congress and includes more than 200 photographs from the Prints and Photographs Division that are now made available to the public for the first time. Born in Slavery was made possible by a major gift from the Citigroup Foundation." Home Page
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Editorial Review - Kirkus Reviews Copyright (c) VNU Business Media, Inc.
A reprint of an autobiography first published in 1861 under a pseudonym. It tells the story of a woman born a slave in 1813 and how she struggled all her life to free herself and those she loved--indeed, as an active abolitionist she fought for the freedom of all the slaves.

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This may be the most important story ever written by a slave woman, capturing as it does the gross indignities as well as the subtler social arrangements of the time. An introduction is invaluable in clarifying many incidents and personalities. Jacobs was fortunate in many respects. Her family was unusually stable, and she had a strong, determined grandmother who, as a freed slave, was to encourage, protect and sustain the author. Surviving everything from a jealous wife to betrayals of all sorts, she managed to do a great many things, any one of which could be considered remarkable given her oppressed status. She resisted the vicious sexual advances of a master, hid out for seven years in her grandmother's attic and eventually escaped to the North. She never ceased plotting the release of her children and though employed as a servant/nanny, managed to write, work for the abolitionist cause and be a source of strength to all. After the Civil War, she returned to the South to help those who were suffering. The author writes with passion and insight into the peculiar institution of slavery. Her writing, modern in several respects, prefigures many of the developments in the later literature of the South.

Reference Books

If you can't find someone's biography online or if you need more information, don't neglect the library's print collection. If you know nothing about a person, begin with Biography and Genealogy Master Index or Biography Index. Those indexes will guide you to sources with biographical sketches about your subject. If you already know something about the person, such as his nationality or occupation, you can begin with a specialized book. For example, if you wanted to know about a U.S. president, you could check American National Biography; if you wanted to know about the author of a book, you might check Contemporary Authors. The specialized works listed below are just a small fraction of the biographical sources available in the Mack Library. Check the library catalog for others, or ask a library worker for a recommendation.

American National Biography by John A. Garraty (Editor); Mark C. Carnes (Editor)
Call Number: 920.073 Am349

ISBN: 0195206355

Publication Date: 1999-01-21

American National Biography is the first new comprehensive biographical dicionary focused on American history to be published in seventy years. Produced under the auspices of the American Council of Learned Societies, the ANB contains over 17,500 profiles on historical figures written by anexpert in the field and completed with a bibliography. The scope of the work is enormous--from the earlest recorded European explorations to the very recent past.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography by H. C. G. Matthew (Editor); Brian Harrison (Editor)
Call Number: 920.041 Ox25

ISBN: 019861411X

Publication Date: 2004-09-23

The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography is a collection of 50,000 specially written biographies of men and women who have shaped all aspects of the British past, from the earliest times to the end of the year 2000, from the ancient (explorer Pytheas of the 4th Century BC) to the modern (Princess Diana). For this new edition, all 36,000 lives from the first edition have been completely rewritten or revised-with over 13,500 new biographies added representing all historical periods and including 3,000 new entries on women.
African American National Biography by Henry Louis Gates Jr.and Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham
Call Number: 920.009296073 Af834

ISBN: 0195160193

A complement to American National Biography, AANB is the most authoritative and comprehensive source for biographies of African Americans.

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