Truth's narrative is a powerful rendering of bondage, denial, and loss transcended by genius, family, and a spiritual base. It juxtaposes spirituality with moral turpitude. Truth was a freethinker who lived within a family of wretched circumstances in New York's Ulster County; she was a wife whose runaway husband had been beated into submission; a mother who reclaimed her only son from a brutal Georgia slaver; a person of principles who was duped by slavers and false prophets; and, finally, at 46, an orator, abolitionist, and member of the Northampton utopian community. As a companion to Truth's narrative, Washington presents a cogent, well-crafted introduction full of historical information that sketches a framework for understanding slavery as it was practiced in the Northeast. This slender book belongs in all literature and history collections.
