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Loading... The Underground Railroad (2016)by Colson Whitehead
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The Underground Railroad is a powerful story mainly well told. Despite that, or perhaps because of it, I didn't enjoy reading it, mostly due to the violence inherent in telling any true or fictional story of slavery. The appallingly brutal conditions of slave life are laid stark and bare, and it made for difficult reading. I was somewhat disappointed in the way that the alternate history - an actual underground rail line - was handled, and had expected more of it, given the novel's title. I can see why the novel won the National Book Award, as its call for abolition and fair treatment of people with black skin is almost as necessary in the 21st century as it was in the early decades of American history, but I was not a fan of the book. ( ) An intriguing and frequently horrifying look at the experience of slavery in the United States prior to the Civil War, from the point of view of the slaves, with an interesting fantastical spin. In reality, “The Underground Railroad” was a metaphor for the chain of sympathisers and safe houses who conveyed escaped slaves from the South to the northern states. In this book, that metaphor is imagined as reality — literal underground rail lines and steam engines carrying escapees north. Though this award-winning book is definitely well worth reading, at the end I wasn’t entirely sure what this fantastical premise adds to the human story of the slaves and the appalling treatment they had to endure. It made me wonder, in fact, how much of the story was based in actual fact and what was part of a dystopian historical fantasy. I’m tempted to say most of it is based on solid, sordid fact, but without doing more research I don’t know. Certainly on its own terms, the novel is heartbreaking as we follow the fortunes of Cora and Caesar attempting to escape from a plantation in Georgia. The chapters are interleaved with actual historical advertisements placed by slave-owners seeking the recovery of their escaped ‘property’. And there’s nothing more chilling than the way the slave-hunter Ridgeway continually and casually refers to an escaped slave as “it” rather than “he” or “she”, the same way as one might refer to an escaped horse. An interesting, brutal and heart breaking book. I’ve seen some other reviews that call Cora unlikable or cold. Just don’t get it. She survives , and somehow, despite rape and torture, still cares if a child trusts her and rejoices in an almanac. Be prepared for a difficult journey, it is not sugar coated, but it is worth it Extraordinary, horrifying and compelling and necessary. Thinking about the sort of sub-genre of works that this feels part of or adjacent to, books like Confessions of the Fox (fiction) and Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments (nonfiction) that address directly the tangled relationship of history, the inherently political nature of documentation or lack thereof, and the task of telling true and necessary stories.
Der Roman des afroamerikanischen Autors Colson Whitehead über die Sklaverei in den USA des 19. Jahrhunderts kommt in deutscher Übersetzung nun gerade recht, um auf den heutigen Rassismus zu verweisen. Is contained inHas as a supplementHas as a student's study guideAwardsDistinctionsNotable Lists
Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted. Their first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city's placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher, is close on their heels. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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