
The true story of an individual's struggle for self-identity, self-preservation, and freedom, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl remains among the few extant slave narratives written by a woman. This autobiographical account chronicles the remarkable odyssey of Harriet...

Harriet Jacobs (1813-1897) was an African-American writer who escaped from slavery and was later freed. She became an abolitionist and reformer. Jacobs wrote an autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, published in 1861 under the pseudonym Linda Brent. It was a reworking...

200th Anniversary Edition Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Harriet Jacobs Writing as Linda Brent "It has been painful to me, in many ways, to recall the dreary years I passed in bondage. I would gladly forget them if I could. Yet the retrospection is not altogether without...


"This may be the most important story ever written by a slave woman, capturing as it does the gross indignities as well as the subtler social arrangements of the time."-Kirkus Review "Of female slave narratives, Harriet Jacobs's Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl,...

One of the central firsthand accounts of slavery in America A haunting, evocative recounting of her life as a slave in North Carolina and of her final escape and emancipation, Harriet Jacobs's classic narrative, written between 1853 and 1858 and published pseduonymously in 1861,...

This enlarged edition of the most significant and celebrated slave narrative now completes the Jacobs family saga, surely one of the most memorable in all of American history. John Jacobs's short slave narrative, A True Tale of Slavery, published in London in 1861, adds a brother's...

In this volume, Jennifer Fleischner examines the first- and best-known female account of life under, and escape from, slavery -- Harriet Jacobs' autobiography. In her introduction, Fleischner shows how Jacobs used the written word to liberate herself and promote the end of slavery...

This Norton Critical Edition includes:

A nice illustrated edition of this classic, powerful autobiography about slavery in the nineteenth century in America. Also includes The Anti-Slavery Alphabet. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, is an autobiography by Harriet Jacobs, a mother and fugitive slave,...

Not only one of the last of over one hundred slave narratives published separately before the Civil War, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) is also one of the few existing narratives written by a woman. It offers a unique perspective on the complex plight of the black...

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl By Harriet Jacobs


Here is one of the few slave narratives written by a women. Slavery is a terrible thing, but it is far more terrible and harrowing for women than for men. Harriet Jacobs was owned by a brutal master who beat his slaves regularly and subjected them to indignations...

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is the stirring autobiography of Harriet Jacobs, a mother and fugitive slave, detailing her harrowing escape from slavery and seven years hiding in an attic crawl space and the racism she faced in freedom. The Norton Library edition presents...

The unflinching nineteenth-century autobiography that broke the silence on the psychosexual exploitation of Black women--with an introduction by Tiya Miles, recipient of a MacArthur "genius" grant " A] crowning achievement . . . Jacobs] remodeled the forms of...

"An example of endurance and persistency in the struggle for liberty" - London Daily News In this harrowing and poignant autobiography, Harriet Ann Jacobs, unveils the brutal reality of life as an enslaved woman in 19th-century America. "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl"...

"One of the major autobiographies of the African-American tradition."--Henry Louis Gates, Jr. "It has been painful to me, in many ways, to recall the dreary years I passed in bondage. I would gladly forget them if I could. Yet the retrospection is not altogether...

Published in 1861, "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" was one of the first personal narratives by a slave and one of the few written by a woman. Jacobs (1813-97) was a slave in North Carolina and suffered terribly, along with her family, at the hands of a ruthless owner...



Written by Harriet Ann Jacobs, using the pen name "Linda Brent," Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is an in-depth chronological account of Jacobs's life as a slave, and the decisions and choices she made to gain freedom for herself and her children. It addresses the...

In 1861, Harriet Jacobs became the first formerly enslaved African American woman to publish a book-length account of her life. In crafting her coming-of-age story, she insisted upon biographical accuracy and bold creativity--telling the truth while giving herself and others...

This enlarged edition of the most significant and celebrated slave narrative completes the Jacobs family saga, surely one of the most memorable in all of American history. John S. Jacobs's short slave narrative, A True Tale of Slavery, published in London in 1861, adds...

This powerful and unflinching memoir by young mother and fugitive slave, Harriet Ann Jacobs (1813 -1897), remains among the few remaining slave narratives written by a woman.