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    Narrative of the Life Frederick Douglass: An American Slave
    Narrative of the Life Frederick Douglass: An American Slave
    Narrative of the Life Frederick Douglass: An American Slave
    Audiobook4 hours

    Narrative of the Life Frederick Douglass: An American Slave

    Written by Frederick Douglas

    Narrated by Raymond Hearn

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    This classic of American literature, a dramatic autobiography of the early life of an American slave, was first published in 1845, when its author had just achieved his freedom. It is a story that shocked the world with its first-hand account of the horrors of slavery. The book was an incredible success. It sold over thirty thousand copies and was an international bestseller. His eloquence gives a clear indication of the powerful principles that led Douglas to become the first great African-American leader in the United States.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAscent Audio
    Release dateOct 1, 2015
    ISBN9781469063140

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    Reviews for Narrative of the Life Frederick Douglass

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    • 4/5
      Compelling
    • 5/5
      For my reading-while-driving I'm dependent on the library audiobook selection, which has very little overlap with anything I'd ever chose on my own. But amidst the dreck there are serendipities, books I never would have tried if not for the lack of any other option -- worlds opened to me that I never would have known otherwise. I certainly never would have considered reading the Narrative of Frederick Douglass -- not from any prejudice or lack of curiousity, but just from the general unexamined assumption that it would not be very interesting. Where do I get these ideas? Anyhow, this is a stunning book, clearly written, with riveting descriptions of life in slavery. It's one of those books -- I also said this about The Bookseller of Kabul -- that opens your eyes and heart to a greater understanding of those facts you already knew. The descriptions of the rags young Frederick had instead of clothes, the constant cursing heaped upon him, his dawning awareness of his own humanity and dignity, his willingness to fight for himself -- this is an eye-opening book that should be read by everyone studying American history.
    • 5/5
      Other reviewers have certainly expressed the compelling nature of Frederick Douglass’ experience in slavery. But there is also his clear, intelligent and transparent prose style that makes this experience come alive in the best possible way. His approach is objective, describing precise detail of how he and his fellow slaves were treated. These are punctuated with beautiful passages of emotion and righteous indignation that are the equal of any other.
    • 4/5
      This was a very compelling story of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. I found it a very interesting read and do recommend it. I also found the story to have an underlying meaning which is why I gave this book high ratings.

      The story is one of Frederick Douglass and the trials and tribulations he goes through as an American Slave. All of the oppressions of slavery are here. He spares no expense describing the autrocities committed by his masters throughout the years. There are a few key points to keep in mind, however, as he narrates this story. First of these is that Frederick Douglass is very well educated. The prose in which he tells the story is exquisite. In fact, one can almost call the language charming. He uses the old English style of writing which very easily puts you, the reader, in the mid to late 1800s where the story takes place.

      Then, what came as a shock to me was the location setting of this story. When one thinks of slavery, the images of the deep south come to mind. Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia are all states that have a rich past in slavery. The south described here is Baltimore. Yeah, that's right Baltimore. Freedom for Frederick Douglas meant New England. Even New York was not a safe haven as Frederick describes stories of kidnappers that are eager to steal runaway slaves back to their masters for a price.

      What I found interesting is that regardless of how the story is told, Frederick Douglass became free in his mind at one particular point in the story. This was long before he took off on his own. I am not going to spoil that part of the story for you, the potential reader of this tale, here in this review. This means that as Frederick Douglass got older, obtaining freedom from slavery became more mental and psychological than physical. It is interesting how he notes that his oppressors did everything possible to keep him ignorant. But it seems that once our author tasted of the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, there was no turning back.

      What I also liked about this book was that the escape was not a dramatic one. There was no running through the woods with the blood hounds hot on his trail. The escape was subtle. Yet I was captivated by how alone he was in his flight. I was captivated by the decisions he made from the lessons he learned in captivity. In the end, it seemed that freedom was obtained when he was in a place where others saw him as a person and not chattle.

      What I disliked about this book was the introductions. Yes there is more than one. It seems that people like Houston A. Baker Jr. had an agenda to push this narrative and this is sad. I felt in reading the narrative that Frederick Douglass true captivity was really a state of mind. What made him different from other negros of the period was that he was able to think and risk on his own. I believe that this thinking brought him to all the right people to give him the opportunity to risk for his freedom. There are times in the story where this risk did not pay off and he did pay the price of treason for his actions. However, overall I feel that the power of his subconcious mind led him to where he wanted to be. At least, I found that this is how it read. Frederick Douglass gave me the impression that he wrote this to set himself as an example of how he became free in his mind first, then achieved it in his physical form. Houston A. Baker Jr. on the other hand seemed to have wanted to distribute this narrative as propaganda to lead other against slavery itself. What's wrong with that you say? I think that Houston A. Baker's introduction was more of, "see how good of a leader I am, regardless of the movement I am leading. See how many people I am connected to in order to push my agenda." The impression I got was that Houston A. Baker had no concern about changing the way people think in order to end slavery in the mind first.
    • 4/5
      A chilling account of one man's lived experience of slavery in Maryland. A heartbreaking tale, that sheds light on the dehumanizing institution that destroys both owner and property and how in the midst of privation young Frederick learned to read and came to live as a free man. A stirring and at times painful memoir.
    • 4/5
      A gripping narrative full of terror, fear, triumph and luck. A bold thing to have written at the time. A good reminder of what humans are capable of on both sides of the spectrum.
    • 5/5
      It’s crazy to imagine how people were treated simply because of the color of their skin. The hypocrisy from religious people still confounds me. I love reading real words of what slaves experienced and went through.
    • 4/5
      This is one of those books I should have read years ago as a history teacher. I have read excerpts of this and many other slave narratives like it, but I enjoyed this read. Having a good background in the history of the time period, there is nothing new here for me and his story mirrors those of many others. The obvious exception to that would be how he spent his life after he gained his freedom, but this story does not cover that time period.

      I imagine that this book had a great impact at the time it was published. Douglas was such a large presence in American politics and abolitionist circles. This book is a great introduction to his story and I would recommend it to any students of history.
    • 4/5
      Brilliant. Glad I finally read this!
    • 5/5
      Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas, was AMAZING. I really feel like I missed out in high school because this wasn't required reading along with Uncle Tom's Cabin. Frederick Douglas was incredible articulate and explained, very reasonably, what it was like to grow up a slave in Talbot County, Maryland, to live in Baltimore, and what the social conditions were. His denunciation of empty and hypocritical religiosity in the appendix was spot on and can ring true even today.Frederick Douglas is an example of someone who was able to use adversity as motivation for self-improvement at whatever cost. Efforts to dissuade him from learning to read and write made him that much more committed to not just learning, but to doing so excellently. Efforts to keep him from escaping only made it inevitable that he would do so. Frederick Douglas can serve as an inspiration to so many of us and an example of perseverance and discipline. He was smart enough to recognize that when something wrong is going on, it's not enough to endure, but one must make efforts to end the problem. Highly highly recommended, and I wish it were required reading for everyone in school everywhere.
    • 5/5
      Please read this book.
    • 4/5
      Frederick Douglass tells of his time as a slave. Often a difficult book to read. It is a first hand account of the horrors of the treatment of the slaves. How the slave holders would justify their behavior. His one good mistress is corrupted by the institution of slavery.
    • 5/5
      Born a slave, Frederick Douglas devoted his life to the Freeing of Slavesfrom the endless horrors of whippings, tortures, hatred, rapes, massacres,and barbaric cruelty.He fought for the right of Black men to fight in the Union Army, then for equal pay.He stood up for Women's Rights and the Right for All to vote.With help from Abolitionist friends, he was able to fully escape slavery and to buy his freedom.
    • 3/5
      Frederick Douglass was a slave in Talbot county, Maryland living in the area of St. Michael's and Baltimore. While living in Baltimore his masters wife taught him the alphabet and started to teach him how to read. When her husband found out he put a stop to it. It was too late Frederick had acquired a love of reading and a lifelong quest for knowledge. Eventually he ran away to the north where he was able to begin a life as a free man.
    • 5/5
      Utterly essential reading for Americans who soon forget that not long ago, men and women like Douglass were kept in human bondage and seen as mere property, with no rights to speak of, left at the mercy of their masters, and all because of the color of their skin. Douglass' account is a haunting detailed personal account of one of - if not the - darkest era in United States history.
    • 4/5
      Why was this not required reading in any of my schooling?!
    • 4/5
      I was surprised how evenhanded his account was, when it had every right to be much more emotionally charged. I was also surprised that the dry, straightforward manner in which Douglass writes did not result in a boring book. On the contrary, it was quite engaging the whole way through.
    • 4/5
      Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass is a book filled with many stories about the evils of slavery. Douglass was a slave for the time he was born who knew his mother, but suspected his master to be his father. The account tells about the mistreatment, abuses, and experiences the slaves encountered in slavery in the South. The slaves’ living conditions were deplorable. There wasn’t enough to eat, and they worked under terrible conditions from morning to sunset throughout the seasons of the year. Their only break came during the Christmas season when the slave masters would permit them to drink liquor, get drunk, and participate in humiliating sports.Fortunately while in Baltimore Douglass was assigned to a family whose wife that had a compassionate heart. And it was through his master’s mistress he was initially treated like an adopted son, and was taught to read. Douglass realized that this knowledge was liberating, and even when his master told the mistress to stop teaching him, he devised other ways of learning from the young white kids he met.As Douglass became older he began to dream about being free. He was instrumental in trying to teach other slaves on the Lloyd Plantation to read in such a way that his master didn’t know. With learning and agitation he was central as they planned their first attempt to escape. But this plan failed and they were sent to prison. After his release and having moved from estate to estate he back again to Baltimore and hired out as a slave. During this apprenticeship he got into fights with whites, but in spite of these difficulties he was able to learn the trade of caulking ships. His pay however went to one of his masters, who would give him a small allowance.Eventually Douglass was becoming more independent in mind and spirit. The book didn’t give details about his eventual success in escaping from slavery, for he didn’t wish the slaveholders to know about these plans. This was because he had no desire of jeopardizing other slaves who would also be planning their escape. But once free he was able to make it to New York. Douglass married another slave Anna, who was free, got in contact with an anti-slavery group, and he and his wife were eventually able to move to New Bedford, Massachusetts, where they put down roots. In New Bedford Douglass found work as a laborer and subscribed to the anti-slavery newspaper the Liberator. He met with abolitionists and eventually became an anti-slavery speaker on the lecture circuit.
    • 4/5
      “You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man.”

      This is the incredible story of Frederick Douglass' education and subsequent escape from slavery. This is very easily read, considering how antiquated it is, and I fully believe that is due to Douglass' writing.

      He is honest, humble, vulnerable and desperate to live a life he feels he deserves. When he wrote of his isolation, of his loss, of his hunger for freedom, for respect, I felt every moment.

      Interesting that there were times in the text that I felt had certainly been touched by white editors. A mention of so-and-so's house (the finest house in Baltimore) and his masters number of horses, the condition of the stables and I knew.

      I didn't care about horses or houses. I wanted Douglass' life, but instead I'm having to read about what white editors in 1845 considered important. I admire editors a lot and think they do a very necessary and unnoticed job, but I felt like these editors tampered with his work.

      Of course, Douglass' words still often came through, ringing out like a bell in the darkness. But every once and a while I would pause and ask myself what a different this book would be if white people had left it well alone.

      We're so lucky Douglass survived and even luckier this book also survived.
    • 4/5
      Obviously, this work belongs to history rather than to a shelf of recent releases. Nonetheless, it is clearly written, interesting, and provides much insight into the mind of nineteenth-century Americans in the North, in the South, and in slavery. I found Douglass's writing abundantly lucid and to the point.

      It's interesting how American in many ways represented two societies at the time - one free, the other deeply tainted by slavery. The claim Douglass makes in this account 15 years before the Civil War is that slavery does not make humanity moral. It cheapens everything.

      In the closing chapters, Douglass describes what freedom in the North was like. He suspected that there would be no rich people in the North because there was no slavery. The only rich people in the South were those with slaves; those without slaves in the South struggled to make ends meet. However, he found that the freedom of the North allowed human freedom to extend into more noble virtues. Life was simply better there.

      One wonders if there are parallels to our much-divided politics today. But that would turn this book review into a political tome. So instead, I will merely say that freedom begets freedom, whether in antebellum America or in a globalized village. I think Douglass's account can take us thus far.
    • 4/5
      What really struck me was how the introductory texts in the preface (written by Douglass's contemporaries and included in the original publication, so I believe they will be in all editions), while sincere and correct, are still fairly inaccessible and overwrought as far as the language is concerned, which has the effect of highlighting the clear, concise wisdom of Frederick Douglass. If you've never read this before and worry it will be dense or inaccessible, don't let that be a stumbling block; the writing is powerful but uncomplicated. Personally, I've read sections of it before in school, but this was my first full read through (even then it's quite short, 122 pages on Kindle). I've always found the idea he presented of slavery itself as a corrupting influence on whites even if they start out with "good" intentions to be really intriguing, so I was hoping for a deeper exploration of that and didn't really find it in the full text. I also completely understand why he omitted the details of how he escaped slavery (the safety of other fleeing slaves who might take the same path), but given that the whole narrative was heading in that direction, it does create an unfortunate disconnect with his story as a narrative at that point. But otherwise the importance of this text is obvious and moving.
    • 4/5
      Interesting story. I only wish there were more details, and that the story went on longer. I especially appreciated Douglass's thoughts on how he changed as a slave, and on how slavery changed individual slaveholders, their society and their religion.
    • 3/5
      A fine book.
    • 5/5
      First-hand account of African American orator Frederick Douglass' early years as an enslaved person. Essential reading for anyone interested in the history of slavery in America.
    • 5/5
      Today it seems like common sense that slavery was a horrible institution of which no good follower of Christ could possibly participate in but that was clearly not always the case.

      Ok, well, I'd agree with Douglass that though there may have been plenty of slave owners who called themselves by that name, it's hard to believe someone could really understand what it means and participate in a system that routinely oppressed and abused the poor and the orphans and the widows. The idea that people will use any means to justify their horrible acts isn't limited to Christianity nor slavery, and unfortunately not even eras gone by.

      I knew coming into the narrative that it would be terrible. Its a book reputed even now to have a played a major role in ending slavery, so there was no way that it was a book that would call entertaining. It doesn't entertain. It informs the reader of the harsh realities of being a slave without signs of embellishments. That said, there was a lot to truly appreciate about Douglass sharing his story and the way in which he did so. Douglass didn't simply share the events of his life but took time fully explaining the surrounding events that contributed to his thoughts and feelings about the situations that he was presented.

      As an example of what I mean, he not only talks about each of the employers his owner sent him to work for as a slave, but also discussed at length the differences between them and the way these differences played out in the treatment of slaves as well as the general slave response to them. He also explains the treatments that he was given with both his assumptions about what his owner or employer was attempting to get from and what he actually got from the experience. This level of awareness seems rare these days.
    • 5/5
      One of my favorite historical figures! Loved learning about his life.
    • 5/5
      This is a must-read. Written shortly after Douglass escaped from slavery, it chronicles his experiences as a slave. Written from both the head and the heart, Douglass' narrative effectively communicates the despair and rage experienced by one whose life is not his own and the longing for simple self-determination. He also provides a deep insight into the dynamics of slavery as it played out in his various masters, the impact on their humanity, the deceit of self and others, and the deep hypocrisy necessitated by the institution of human bondage. Slavery was not an abstract institution. Conscious human beings were deprived of the most basic human needs, dignity, and ownership of their own selves. To read about the experience by one who grew up in its shackles far exceeds any and all intellectual or philosophical musings on its evil.
    • 4/5
      As a white Canadian, I think I have a not very admirable tendency to abstract the hell out of American slavery--to make it about the revolting idea of people owning other people (which it is) and then somehow less about what that meant: the sheer incomprehensible mass of abuses, from the daily sneer to the atrocities of casual, consequenceless rape and murder. Frederick Douglass is the antidote to that, one of the great testifiers to slavery's evil, and a hell of a man. This one's good to read (as a white North American person) any time you start to get tired of bringing to your relations with race, and with race relations, and with your friends and neighbours of other races all your gathered sincerity and humility and care.
    • 4/5
      Frederick Douglass wrote this narrative shortly after his escape from bondage and, as such, it focuses primarily on his life as a slave without much detail on the means by which he effected his escape as such information could put those who helped him in danger. The volume includes a preface from William Lloyd Garrison that outlines the abolitionist goals of the narrative. Douglass' longest chapter details the brutality of slavery, from beatings and whippings to the manner in which slaveholders bred their slaves. Douglass' narrative was first and foremost an abolition narrative with a stated goal. He concludes that he wrote "sincerely and earnestly hoping that this little book may do something toward throwing light on the American slave system and hastening the glad day of deliverance to the millions of my brethren in bonds" (76). While that does not discount the accuracy of what he wrote, readers should read this volume in the context in which Douglass wrote in order to better appreciate the argument he was making for abolition.
    • 5/5
      It's interesting how the story of one person can have a greater impact than the history of a people or event. In this extraordinary autobiography of abolitionist and escaped slave Frederick Douglass, we are given an intimate window into the everyday world of slavery, and it is ugly. I have read only one other book that made me feel so profoundly the lack of humanity and the evil of which humans are capable, and that was "People of the Lie" by M. Scott Peck, in which he describes parents who, for Christmas, gift their surviving son the rifle used by another son to kill himself. Reading Peck's description of a truly evil person, it seems he could have just read Douglass' book: (Adapted from Wikipedia):- Consistently self-deceiving, with the intent of avoiding guilt and maintaining a self-image of perfection- Projects his or her evils and sins onto very specific targets while being apparently normal with everyone else - Commonly hates with the pretense of love- Abuses political (emotional) power - Maintains a high level of respectability, and lies incessantly in order to do so- Is consistent in his or her sins. Evil persons are characterized not so much by the magnitude of their sins, but by their consistency of destructiveness. - Is unable to think from the viewpoint of his or her victim- Has a covert intolerance to criticismDouglass tells his story of being born and kept as a slave, and his escape to the North in his early twenties, in a style that highlights the evil he experienced and/or observed in Maryland:- being removed from his mother's care by the age of one, with almost no contact allowed with her for the rest of his life- being clothed as a child only in a knee-length shirt, summer or winter, and going naked if the shirt wore out before the annual clothing allotment - having no provision for beds or bedding except for a single blanket - routine rape of women to increase slaveholders' assets and wealth- deliberate near-starvation of slaves, with stock animals being well-cared for and slaves whipped for any perceived lack of attention to the animals' well-being- slaveholders' (both men and women) and overseers' enjoyment of frequent, repeated, and lengthy slave whippings, often for no reason than satisfaction- old slaves being put out into the forest to fend for themselves - the inevitable degeneration into depravity of whites who were new to slaveholding (thorough marriage, for instance) The book skips over the exact method Douglass used to escape, in order to protect others and not give slaveholders any tips, but in his final autobiography, after the Civil War, he did give a detailed account. The book ends with him in New Bedford, MA, with a new bride and making his way among the wonders of freedom, irrespective of the hostility shown blacks by northern whites afraid for their jobs. There's also an epilogue Douglass wrote to clarify his comments on the "Christianity" he observed in both the South and the North. It's not pretty. Ministers going home to rape, preachers spending the rest of the week whipping humans, respectable citizens spending their time finding new ways to force compliance, whether it be though intimidation, murder, or forcible separation of families. More than anywhere else, this is where Douglass expresses his anger.