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Jul 11, 2011

Flannery added it

Okay, the cutest old man was one our bazillion proctors at the bar exam and I joked with him in the elevator about how, if I were him, I'd be freaking psyched for the day because it would mean 8 hours of reading. He told me all about how he was reading this interesting book. He came over later and asked me for my address so he could mail it to me when he finished it:-) But when I turned in my last set of questions for the day, he said he finished it for me and forked it over. What a sweetheart! More...

8 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jan 14, 2008

Sarah rated it:

Well, it's a detailed book of the de-womanizing cruelties of slavery, which is always an interesting and educational read, but never easy or uplifting read. One thing I liked about this book compared to other slavery experience books I've read is the heart-wrenching description of the "slave mother's" soul, heartache, trials, worries, etc. The huge reason, though, I only gave this book 2 stars was because of my innate skepticism and the debated controversary always surrounding this bo More...

9 comments like (7 people liked it)

Feb 03, 2010

Adrianna rated it:

I had read this narrative before, at least three different times, but the repeat reading only brings more of the details to the reader's attention. Since the previous readings were so long ago, I didn't remember too many of the details of the narrative. It was like I was reading Jacobs' story for the first time. Harriet Ann Jacobs is very deliberate in her language and the way she acts as supplicator and judge. The complexity of the language is often overshadowed by the "flowery" writi More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Athena rated it:

Next time you hear somebody going on about how the "mulatto" or "house negro" class in slave days were "privileged" and "got over" on the "field negroes," tell them to read this book. Sure, the "mulatto" or "light-skinned" slaves got to work in the house or were sometimes allowed to work away from the plantation in a trade and sometimes got to keep their own money. If they were really lucky, they might be taught to read on the More...

3 comments like (3 people liked it)

Oct 05, 2011

Brian rated it:

It is presented as a true account of the life of a slave in 19th century America.Written by the young slave girl herself who learned to write later in life, it cannot be expected she develop style. It is hard to believe not in its awfulness but in the coincidental meetings, lucky escapes and more particularly an account of prolonged hideout in a small town. Its very monotony and sameness is the unintended painful thread running through her life. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl was a best More...

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Sep 22, 2011

Nicole rated it:

For the most part, stories like this are not ones that I read willingly. I am not someone who follows after those persecuted and who have gone through many hardships that are based on reality because, like everyone else, I have enough hardships and things in my own life that I have to deal with. I read usually to get away from reality, and to expand the creativity and horizons of my imaginative mind. Nevertheless, I will give credit where credit is due, and although I did not love this story--fo More...

4 comments like (2 people liked it)

Apr 12, 2011

Stephanie rated it:

Granted, I would never have known of this book had it not been an assigned read, and that's a shame. That is why I am reviewing this book despite the fact that we were instructed not to review assigned books. This is, undoubtedly, a book that should be read not only by someone pursuing a college degree, but by anyone who is capable of reading. The writing style is bold and straight-forward. Jacobs appeals directly to the reader many times making it impossible for one to feel far removed from the More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 19, 2010

Svitlana rated it:

This by far is my favorite slave narrative! Some of the major themes portrayed include self-assertion, family bond, unity, dependence, resistance, equality, and identity. What I have learned from this book is to never give up, because regardless of the circumstances if you continue to fight there will always be hope, since you, yourself are the last hope and it is up to you to make it last. Linda is a symbol of a strong female who never gives up; always keeps moving forward to accomplish her dre More...

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Sep 24, 2010

Susan is currently reading it

Letters of a Slave Girl by Mary Lyons was recommended to me, and maybe that one is easier to read than this book. That is a novel based on the life of Harriet Jacobs, and this book was actually written by her. She was a slave in the town I grew up in. It's been hard for me to finish it because it is really hard to let my mind be taken into a society like that. Her owner was a prominent member of the community, the doctor. I keep thinking, "I'm so glad I have never heard that the town doctor More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Sep 23, 2010

Sophia rated it:

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl was a truly eye opening book. Harriet Jacobs, former slave, voices the story of her life through fictional character and narrator Linda Brent because Jacobs knew she would not be allowed to share her story with others. In the book, she discusses the story of her enslavement beginning as a child, and the corruption and sexual exploitation she experienced during her life, and her struggle to save her children and become a free woman.

In the book, J More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Sep 06, 2010

Rosanne rated it:

As my book club presses on with autobiographies in a chronological fashion, we’ve made our way to the American Civil War. The first of two slave narratives that we are reading is Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, by Harriet Jacobs. Next month we’ll be reading The Life of Frederick Douglass. I won’t recount all the details of Harriet Jacob’s story, but instead, simply tell the two things that impressed me the most about it.

First, I never cease to be astounded by the religious hyp More...

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May 13, 2010

Nick rated it:

My eighth grade history teacher, who fancied himself an iconoclast conservative in a sea of conformist liberals, once said in class that slaveowners treated slaves well because they needed to protect their property, like a Cadillac. He did not ask what the single African-American in that advance class thought. I recently heard someone take the same faux inconoclastic position. If there is justice, I hope both men are sentenced to read this book for eternity. What Jacobs proves is that slaveo More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Jun 20, 2009

Anna rated it:

Having read Frederick Douglass's autobiography, I am convinced that the way a story is told depends truly on the story teller. As Douglass tells of his experience of slavery from the male's perspective, Jacobs presents to her readers an opportunity to see what slavery was like for women and children. As a woman, Jacobs's cry is not only for freedom from the bondage of slavery, but for freedom to obtain what is known as "The Cult of True Womanhood," an ideology that elevated middle-cla More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jun 15, 2009

Karen rated it:

What I learned from this book was to never give up! Harriet Jacobs, a slave a plantation thinks it's time to run away when her "owner" starts to take a sexual interest in her. She hides in the attic of her gradma's cottage for about 7 years(a space about 6ft. x 3ft., also she had to lay down in order to fit!) before she finds an opportunity to escape. She literally watched her kids grow up through the cracks of the attic. I just don't know if I have it in me.

I said that More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Dec 20, 2011

Valerie rated it:

This book was a lot better than I had expected, and that was even considering I knew it was by a former slave. Anyway, below is a review I wrote for a school paper I had to do.

In Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl she chronicles her life as a slave in the 1800s in the South under the name Linda. Her narrative begins with the beginning of her life and ends with her emancipation. She relates to her audience how she was orphaned at a young age and her happy early youth More...

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Jan 17, 2012

Karyl rated it:

Harriet Jacobs, writing as Linda Brent, gives an intimate view of what it means to be a slave in the mid 1800s. Looking back at this time as a 21st century woman, it is so hard to believe that Jacobs's contemporaries would have to be convinced of the innate wrongness of owning another human, yet that is what this book sets out to achieve. Jacobs knows her life is easy for a slave; she lives with her grandmother for much of her life, works in the house instead of the fields, and her uncle is al More...

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Jul 31, 2011

Margaret added it

I read this right after reading a fictional account of a slave girl (The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill - I recommend it) because I was definitely still interested in the topic and I have to say that 1) Harriet's life was actually harder and more difficult than a fictional account and 2) the fictional account was very good and historically accurate - the books validated each other.

While interesting, this book was a little slow-going due to the footnotes - I felt compelled to look up each and e More...

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Oct 27, 2011

Sarah rated it:

This book chronicles most of the life of a young woman, Linda, born into slavery. Linda is a mulatto girl who works for a doctor and his family. By the standards of the time for slaves, she leads a fairly comfortable life. This changes, however, once her master begins to take an "interest" in her. The story follows her becoming a mother, living in hiding for several years and then her experience as a black woman living in the North after her escape, where she found life to be less More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 19, 2009

Tiffany rated it:

I love this book. I have loved it since the first time I read it in my African-American history survey course as a sophomore in college and can't believe it is not cited more often as a primary source in analyses of the slave experience. This book can be read on so many different levels. When it was first assigned to me, it was meant to be read in relationship to Frederick Douglass's My Bondage and My Freedom, to help us compare and contrast the experience of slavery for men and women. But re-re More...

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Jan 17, 2012

Rachel rated it:

I didn't enjoy reading this narrative autobiography at all. Although it has prestige because it is one of the first female slave narratives that was published, this account just falls flat for me. I couldn't really connect with the author as I was reading, partly because the writing was a bit tedious to read, partly because I really wasn't interested in the story to begin with, and partly because I just couldn't understand the narrator's logic...For instance, in order to protect her virginity More...

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Oct 16, 2010

Julie rated it:

Amazing. Inspiring. Heartbreaking. Insightful. Thought-provoking. Should be required reading for high school students across the country.

Harriet Ann Jacobs was born into slavery in the early 1800's, and by all accounts began her life in fairly happy and pleasant surroundings, comparatively speaking. Harriet's mother died when she was 6 years old, and Harriet was taken in by her mother's mistress. This woman provided a loving and warm home, and taught Harriet to read and write. She expe More...

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Dec 08, 2008

Lataun rated it:

I have read a lot of true stories this fall about women who are oppressed. I think this one has affected me the most. This book is the epitomy of service and sacrifice given by a mother.

A lot of the books I've read lately on this subject have occurred in other countries and I can kind of distance myself from the atrocities that take place. This book was about slavery in my own country and I am embarassed that this happened here. How could we be so ignorant and cruel and believe More...

3 comments like (2 people liked it)

Feb 07, 2012

Karolin rated it:

Generally, I didn't really enjoy reading this book, because I dislike the style of writing even when I take the genre and epoche into consideration. In large parts, I found Jacob's narration redundant. Also, I don't like that the readers have no chance to receive an impression of her character as well as the characters of everyone around her (friend or foe)through their own reading experience. Jacobs doesn't get tired of commenting nearly every single action of the people around her by either pr More...

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Mar 13, 2010

Sydney rated it:

This should be required reading for any American. In fact, I think most high school students are assigned this book, but I am ashamed to say I had never heard of it. My friend from work gave it to me in an attempt to educate me on black history/literature. Needless to say, I have obviously have come off as rather ignorant on the subject as I have found so many of these books recommended to me (or, thrust upon me) lately. The author of this autobiography, Ms. Harriet Ann Jacobs, was born a sl More...

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May 08, 2009

Dana rated it:

I just finished this book, I listened to the audio version after checking it out yesterday afternoon at the library. I loved this on audio. This book made my heart break for Linda and countless other mothers thrown into the horrors of slavery. I am also appalled at some of the other reviews I have read that want to pick the book apart implying Linda was not educated and could not have written the book so flowery. She did know how to read and write and people spoke differently in those days an More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Oct 30, 2008

Katie rated it:

I was given the pleasure of reading this book for a class in college, so I had the opportunity to discuss it at length with other young, eager minds (well, some were eager and not all were young). A story that can break your heart at what hardships people of our country went through just for being different.

2 comments like (2 people liked it)

Apr 11, 2011

Salha rated it:

I cried for what happened to her specially at the end when her grandmother died. Martha was an Angel, a lightening candle in the life of her family. Endless support to shelter the poor grandchildren.
I hated the Doctor for being inhuman and cruel and I wished that he died earlier. I really loved Linda,her family and friends..I wounder if I would act like her if I were in her place, how painful is it to daily see her children and unable to hug them for continuous 7 years!
I learned many More...

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May 21, 2009

Rachel rated it:

Although the book was very interesting from a historical perspective, the narrative itself was hard to get into and, upon first reading, hard to believe. I told a classmate that I didn't think this could possibly be written by a slave because her concerns were too trivial, too middle-class, too . . . white. What I didn't know was that Jacobs' narrative was carefully crafted to have the maximum effect on her target audience--middle-class, Northern white women. Jacobs used the conventions of th More...

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Nov 08, 2011

S rated it:

What makes this autobiography so compelling is not just the language that Harriet Jacobs uses to tell her story, but the story itself. As the autobiography of a female slave, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl paints an often-unseen portrait of colonial life for both Jacobs and other slaves of the era.

The prose itself is typical of the time in which it was published, and so tends towards longer sentences that may lose readers that aren't used to the stylistic elements of older wri More...

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Oct 14, 2011

Luckngrace rated it:

Incredibly well written. Anyone reading this autobiography will feel the truth and pain and feel shame if they're from the South as am I, for this part of our history. Never having been beaten or physically abused, Linda suffers just the same, including separation of just a few yards from her two children for YEARS while she hides in a 6 X 8 foot cubby from her evil owners and slavecatchers. As you would guess, she couldn't have told her story hadn't she finally made it North to freedom. She ple More...

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