frederick douglass biography david blight

Now there’s a way to directly enable these efforts. Support the Independent by making a direct contribution or with a subscription to Indy+. David Blight has written the definitive biography of Frederick Douglass. The extraordinary life Frederick Douglass lived, from its origin in bondage to its culmination as one of the most recognizable Americans of his era, was rooted in the soil of a progressive humanity, sustained by the ideals of freedom, dignity, and the rule of law.Įvery day, the staff of the Santa Barbara Independent works hard to sort out truth from rumor and keep you informed of what’s happening across the entire Santa Barbara community. Douglass’s fierce intelligence and moral courage were only one side of the man for nearly half a century he shouldered burdens as the representative man of his race, and as the patriarch of a large extended family that was a source of joy, consternation, and heartbreak.Īs a biographer and scholar, Blight is equal to the complexity and stature of his subject. The Boston Globe David Blight’s incandescent Frederick Douglass is a monumental achievement of biographical empathy, historical context, and grim comprehensiveness, a much-awaited masterpiece of a life that emblematized slavery as the problem of the 19th century, as was race that of Du Bois’s 20th, the legacy of both the problem of. Writing to a friend in 1874 Douglass described the moral atmosphere in Washington, D.C., as “rotten, full of avarice, duplicity, corruption, fawning and trickery of all kinds.” Blight’s work sharpens our understanding of Douglass’s life and influence on the nation, not only as a fiery abolitionist, but as a staunch defender of Reconstruction. Blight’s Pulitzer Prize–winning biography, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, will recognize the similarities and hear the echoes of the past in the present. Prophet of Freedom by Frederick Douglass | Credit: CourtesyĪny reader of Yale historian David W.

Frederick douglass biography david blight