Twelve Years a Slave

English language

Published Feb. 4, 2014

ISBN:: 978-0-00-758042-2

(1 review)

Twelve Years a Slave is an 1853 memoir and slave narrative by American Solomon Northup as told to and written by David Wilson. Northup, a black man who was born free in New York state, details himself being tricked to go to Washington, D.C., where he was kidnapped and sold into slavery in the Deep South. He was in bondage for 12 years in Louisiana before he was able to secretly get information to friends and family in New York, who in turn secured his release with the aid of the state. Northup's account provides extensive details on the slave markets in Washington, D.C. and New Orleans, and describes at length cotton and sugar cultivation and slave treatment on major plantations in Louisiana. The work was published eight years before the Civil War by Derby & Miller of Auburn, New York, soon after Harriet Beecher Stowe's best-selling novel about slavery, …

Twelve Years a Slave is an 1853 memoir and slave narrative by American Solomon Northup as told to and written by David Wilson. Northup, a black man who was born free in New York state, details himself being tricked to go to Washington, D.C., where he was kidnapped and sold into slavery in the Deep South. He was in bondage for 12 years in Louisiana before he was able to secretly get information to friends and family in New York, who in turn secured his release with the aid of the state. Northup's account provides extensive details on the slave markets in Washington, D.C. and New Orleans, and describes at length cotton and sugar cultivation and slave treatment on major plantations in Louisiana. The work was published eight years before the Civil War by Derby & Miller of Auburn, New York, soon after Harriet Beecher Stowe's best-selling novel about slavery, Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852), to which it lent factual support. Northup's book, dedicated to Stowe, sold 30,000 copies, making it a bestseller in its own right.After being published in several editions in the 19th century and although later cited by specialist scholarly works on slavery in the United States, the memoir fell into public obscurity for nearly 100 years. It was re-discovered on separate occasions by two Louisiana historians, Sue Eakin (Louisiana State University at Alexandria) and Joseph Logsdon (University of New Orleans). In the early 1960s, they researched and retraced Solomon Northup's journey and co-edited a historically annotated version that was published by Louisiana State University Press (1968).The memoir has been adapted as two film versions, produced as the 1984 PBS television film Solomon Northup's Odyssey and the 2013 film 12 Years a Slave, which won multiple Oscars including Best Picture.

5 editions

protomattr reviewed Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup

Review of 'Twelve Years a Slave' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

What an incredibly powerful and moving page-turner! This true story is an American Odyssey, with the author-protagonist playing (living) the title role and his masters, in particular the raged drunkard Epps, who owns Northup for most of his captivity, playing the cyclopes. Northup was born free in New York (though not Ithaca) and was wont to take odd jobs to support his wife and three kids, and pursue the American dream. He was also a talented violinist, and unfortunately it was this skill that brought him to Washington, DC, and the slave states, where he was drugged, kidnapped, and sold into slavery on the bayous of Louisiana. But it also helped him survive, as did his Odyssean wit and wiles, until he returned to his home and freedom twelve years later, aided by northern abolitionists and the state of New York.

Besides being a great story, this book is a …

What an incredibly powerful and moving page-turner! This true story is an American Odyssey, with the author-protagonist playing (living) the title role and his masters, in particular the raged drunkard Epps, who owns Northup for most of his captivity, playing the cyclopes. Northup was born free in New York (though not Ithaca) and was wont to take odd jobs to support his wife and three kids, and pursue the American dream. He was also a talented violinist, and unfortunately it was this skill that brought him to Washington, DC, and the slave states, where he was drugged, kidnapped, and sold into slavery on the bayous of Louisiana. But it also helped him survive, as did his Odyssean wit and wiles, until he returned to his home and freedom twelve years later, aided by northern abolitionists and the state of New York.

Besides being a great story, this book is a fascinating vignette of America in the years preceding the Civil War, and in particular, life on the southern plantation in the 1840s.