ISBN
9780062748201
Publication Date
2018
Price
$45.00
Publisher
Amistad
Abstract
Author and historian/folklorist Zora Neale Hurston, who died in obscurity in 1960, is back on the bookshelves in a significant way. Her first book, Barracoon, has finally been published. She completed the work in 1931 but could never interest publishers in the true saga of Cudjo Lewis, thought to be the last living person enslaved in Africa and transported to the United States by the slave ship Clotilda. Part of the reason the book encountered obstacles was the inclusion of dialect in Hurston's interviews with Kossula, Lewis's African name. Another part was the topic itself. Not only is the slave trade discussed in great detail, but the responsibility of initial captures of Africans by the Dahomey is clearly outlined: black Africans captured and sold other black Africans to European slave traders for profit.
DOI
10.31390/cwbr.21.4.03
Recommended Citation
Groeling, Meg
(2019)
"Civil War Obscura: Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo","
Civil War Book Review: Vol. 21
:
Iss.
4
.
DOI: 10.31390/cwbr.21.4.03
Available at:
https://repository.lsu.edu/cwbr/vol21/iss4/3
