{"product_id":"clotel-isbn-9780679783237","title":"Clotel","description":"The first novel published by an African American, Clotel takes up the story, in circulation at the time, that Thomas Jefferson fathered an illegitimate mulatto daughter who was sold into slavery. Powerfully reimagining this story, and weaving together a variety of contemporary source materials, Brown fills the novel with daring escapes and encounters, as well as searing depictions of the American slave trade. An innovative and challenging work of literary invention, Clotel is receiving much renewed attention today. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWilliam Wells Brown, though born into slavery, escaped to become one of the most prominent reformers of the nineteenth century and one of the earliest historians of the black experience. This Modern Library Paperback Classics edition reproduces the first, 1853, edition of Clotel and includes, as did that edition, his autobiographical narrative, \"The Life and Escape of William Wells Brown,\" plus newly written notes.\"A remarkable beginning for African-American fiction.\"\u003cbr\u003e--Henry Louis Gates, Jr.\u003cb\u003eWilliam Wells Brown\u003c\/b\u003e (ca. 1814–1884) was an abolitionist and social reformer best remembered as the United States’ first black novelist and playwright, as well as one of the earliest African-American historians. After escaping from slavery on New Year’s Day in 1834, he went on to publish a bestselling memoir, a collection of antislavery songs, the novel \u003ci\u003eClotel\u003c\/i\u003e, and many other highly regarded works.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eHilton Als \u003c\/b\u003eis a staff writer for \u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e. His work also appears in \u003ci\u003eThe New York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e. He is the author of \u003ci\u003eThe Women \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e White Girls\u003c\/i\u003e. He lives in New York.The Negro Sale.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Why stands she near the auction stand,\u003cbr\u003eThat girl so young and fair?\u003cbr\u003eWhat brings her to this dismal place,\u003cbr\u003eWhy stands she weeping there?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith the growing population of slaves in the Southern States of America,\u003cbr\u003ethere is a fearful increase of half whites, most of whose fathers are\u003cbr\u003eslaveowners, and their mothers slaves. Society does not frown upon the man\u003cbr\u003ewho sits with his mulatto child upon his knee, whilst its mother stands a\u003cbr\u003eslave behind his chair. The late Henry Clay, some years since, predicted\u003cbr\u003ethat the abolition of Negro slavery would be brought about by the\u003cbr\u003eamalgamation of the races. John Randolph, a distinguished slaveholder of\u003cbr\u003eVirginia, and a prominent statesman, said in a speech in the legislature of\u003cbr\u003ehis native state, that \"the blood of the first American statesmen coursed\u003cbr\u003ethrough the veins of the slave of the South.\" In all the cities and towns\u003cbr\u003eof the slave states, the real Negro, or clear black, does not amount to\u003cbr\u003emore than one in every four of the slave population. This fact is, of\u003cbr\u003eitself, the best evidence of the degraded and immoral condition of the\u003cbr\u003erelation of master and slave in the United States of America.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn all the slave states, the law says:?\"Slaves shall be deemed, sold\u003cbr\u003e[held], taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be chattels personal in the\u003cbr\u003ehands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators\u003cbr\u003eand assigns, to all intents, constructions, and purposes whatsoever. A\u003cbr\u003eslave is one who is in the power of a master to whom he belongs. The master\u003cbr\u003emay sell him, dispose of his person, his industry, and his labour. He can\u003cbr\u003edo nothing, possess nothing, nor acquire anything, but what must belong to\u003cbr\u003ehis master. The slave is entirely subject to the will of his master, who\u003cbr\u003emay correct and chastise him, though not with unusual rigour, or so as to\u003cbr\u003emaim and mutilate him, or expose him to the danger of loss of life, or to\u003cbr\u003ecause his death. The slave, to remain a slave, must be sensible that there\u003cbr\u003eis no appeal from his master.\" Where the slave is placed by law entirely\u003cbr\u003eunder the control of the man who claims him, body and soul, as property,\u003cbr\u003ewhat else could be expected than the most depraved social condition? The\u003cbr\u003emarriage relation, the oldest and most sacred institution given to man by\u003cbr\u003ehis Creator, is unknown and unrecognised in the slave laws of the United\u003cbr\u003eStates. Would that we could say, that the moral and religious teaching in\u003cbr\u003ethe slave states were better than the laws; but, alas! we cannot. A few\u003cbr\u003eyears since, some slaveholders became a little uneasy in their minds about\u003cbr\u003ethe rightfulness of permitting slaves to take to themselves husbands and\u003cbr\u003ewives, while they still had others living, and applied to their religious\u003cbr\u003eteachers for advice; and the following will show how this grave and\u003cbr\u003eimportant subject was treated:?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Is a servant, whose husband or wife has been sold by his or her master\u003cbr\u003einto a distant country, to be permitted to marry again?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe query was referred to a committee, who made the following report;\u003cbr\u003ewhich, after discussion, was adopted:?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"That, in view of the circumstances in which servants in this country are\u003cbr\u003eplaced, the committee are unanimous in the opinion, that it is better to\u003cbr\u003epermit servants thus circumstanced to take another husband or wife.\"Introduction by Hilton Als \"A remarkable beginning for African-American fiction.\"-Henry Louis Gates, Jr.;","brand":"Modern Library","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46300890136805,"sku":"NP9780679783237","price":19.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780679783237.jpg?v=1767723852","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/clotel-isbn-9780679783237","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}