UP FROM SLAVERY: An Autobiography
First edition of Washington's autobiography, detailing his rise from a life born into slavery to becoming the esteemed leader of the Tuskegee Institute.
Near fine.
"Washington was the greatest Negro leader since Frederick Douglas and the most distiguished leader, black or white, to come out of the South." - W.E.B. Du Bois
Booker T. Washington's dogged hard work and personal brand of bootstrapping, while sometimes criticized by contemporaries such as W.E.B. Du Bois, was an inspiration to many. His advocacy for the rights and education of Black Americans - discussed in this his most famous work - made him one of the most influential forces in the post-Reconstruction era. UP FROM SLAVERY was ranked third on The Modern Library's list of the 100 best nonfiction books of the 20th century, and until the publication of THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MALCOLM X it remained the best-selling African American autobiography of all time (Alridge 270). A handsome copy of a landmark book.
Read more: Derrick Alridge, "Booker T. Washington," in Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019, edited by Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain.
New York: Doubleday, Page & Co, 1901. 8'' x 5.5''. Original red cloth boards with gilt lettering. Top edge gilt. Fore-edge machine deckle. Black-and-white pictorial frontispiece. Variant with "Author of" phrase on title page. x, 330 pages, including index. Ink owner name, dated Dec 25 1901 (year of publication), to front fly leaf. Touches of rubbing at extremities. Slight lean. Some cracking to gutter of early leaf (still firm), else clean and sound throughout.