Minnie's Sacrifice: Sowing and Reaping Trial and Triumph : Three Rediscovered Novels (BLACK WOMEN WRITER SERIES) - Hardcover

Harper, Frances E. W.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0807083321 ISBN 13: 9780807083321

Publisher: Beacon Pr, 1994

Synopsis

An exciting recovery of three classic novels by the best-known African-American woman writer of the nineteenth century offers timeless tales dealing with social justice, love, and sexuality, offering innumerable insights into the lives of African Americans a century ago.

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Reviews

Harper's Iola Leroy is a classic of 19th-century African American women's fiction. These three recently excavated short novels add depth and historical perspective to her legacy, while displaying new facets of her inspirational voice. Writing about the injustices of slavery and the difficulties faced by black women after the Civil War, Harper combines the clean, elegant style of Austen and Bronte with a powerful talent for social advocacy. Minnie's Sacrifice (1869) is the best of the three, dissecting the difficult choices faced by a light-skinned husband and wife when they learn, after having been raised as white, that their veins run with African American blood. Sowing and Reaping (1876-1877) is less ambiguous; a product of the temperance movement, it offers a sternly moralistic look at the evils of John Barleycorn. The weakest entry is Trial and Triumph (1888-1889), which presents a series of simple, right-or-wrong tales about postwar racial blending that reads like a barely stitched-together collection of short stories. While there is some excellent writing here, Harper's story construction is stilted, and the occasional missing chapter disrupts continuity (the narratives are incomplete because their only prior publication was in serial form, in poorly kept copies of a 19th-century African American periodical, The Christian Register ). Despite these flaws, Harper's trilogy represents a historical breakthrough and a worthy addition to the literature of the period.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Through her highly moral and socially responsible characters, a 19th-century African-American writer presents a broad, lively range of political and personal views about being treated as America's second-class citizens. These three novels, originally serialized in the mid-to-late- 1800s in Christian Recorder (the journal of the African Methodist Episcopal Church), were recently rediscovered by editor Foster (Literature/Univ. of California, San Diego) while doing research on Harper. The eponymous heroine of Minnie's Sacrifice is a young woman of mixed race spirited away from the South and raised in the North by a gentle, loving Quaker couple. Her true racial heritage is kept from her until one day her escaped slave mother surprises her on the street. Minnie marries Louis, who has also been ignorant of his mixed race parentage; after the war they bravely live in the South to work for the personal and economic uplifting and empowerment of their race--until tragedy strikes. Sowing and Reaping is a paean to the virtues of avoiding the decadence of drink; it uses contrasting pairs of friends--frivolous Jeanette and Charles, steady Belle and Paul--to tell a story of temperance and self-destruction. In Trial and Triumph, Annette Harcourt moves through a lonely childhood and awkward adolescence to become a beloved teacher and poet in her community, finding love only after years of hard work and sacrifice. Foster has ably edited and introduced the novels, putting in context melodramatic plots and highly stylized language that may seem dated or off-putting to some readers. An important addition to 19th-century American literature, addressing weighty questions of race, community, and citizenship that are still being posed today. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

These three 19th-century novels were recently rediscovered by scholar Foster while researching the African American author's life and career. Originally serialized in the Christian Recorder between 1868 and 1888, these pioneering novels championed the cause of African American equality and rights. An important find, this combined volume is essential for all public and academic library collections.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Beacon Pr
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0807083321
• ISBN 13: 9780807083321
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352
• Editor: Foster Frances Smith