There Was Once a Slave … (Masterplots II: Juvenile and Young Adult Biography Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Shirley Graham
- First Published: 1947
- Time of Work: 1834–1895
- Setting: The United States, Great Britain, Ireland, France, Italy, North Africa, and Haiti
- Principal Characters: Frederick Douglass, Anna Murray Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, John Brown, Amelia Kemp, Abraham Lincoln, Gamaliel Bailey, Charles Sumner, Hugh Auld, Edward Covey
- Genres: Nonfiction, Biography
- Subjects: African Americans, Social action, Journalism or journalists, Social reform, Racism, Abolitionists, Slavery or slaves, Public speaking, Speeches, Biography
- Locales: Africa, France, United States, Haiti, Italy, Ireland, Great Britain
Form and Content
Shirley Graham’s There Was Once a Slave …: The Heroic Story of Frederick Douglass is a biography that reads much more like a novel. Eschewing the detail-oriented, documentary tone of much biographical writing, Graham freely invents scenes, dialogue, and descriptive details that blend to create an evocative tapestry of Douglass’ life.
The book is divided into four parts, corresponding to four stages in Douglass’ life, and the parts have metaphoric titles: “The Road,” “The Lightning,” “The Storm,” and “Toward Morning.” Each...
[The entire page is 1400 words long]
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