The Portable Nineteenth-Century African American Women Writers Read online

  PENGUIN CLASSICS

  THE PORTABLE NINETEENTH-CENTURY AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMEN WRITERS

  HOLLIS ROBBINS, PH.D., is Director of the Center for Africana Studies at Johns Hopkins University and Chair of the Humanities Department at the Peabody Institute, where she has taught since 2006. Her work focuses on the intersection of nineteenth-century American and African American literature and the discourses of law, bureaucracy, and the press. Robbins has edited or coedited four books on nineteenth-century African American literature, including the Penguin edition of Frances E. W. Harper’s 1892 novel Iola Leroy, or Shadows Uplifted. She is also the coeditor with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., of The Annotated Uncle Tom’s Cabin (2006) and In Search of Hannah Crafts (2004). She is currently completing a monograph, Forms of Contention: The African American Sonnet Tradition.

  HENRY LOUIS GATES, JR., is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and founding director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. He is editor in chief of the Oxford African American Studies Center and TheRoot.com, and creator of the highly praised PBS documentary The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross. He is general editor for a Penguin Classics series of African American works.

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  Introduction, notes and selection copyright © 2017 by Hollis Robbins and Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

  General introduction copyright © 2008 by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  Selections from The Bondwoman’s Narrative by Hannah Crafts, edited by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Copyright © 2002, 2003 by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Reprinted with permission of Grand Central Publishing.

  Ebook ISBN: 9780143130673

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Names: Robbins, Hollis, 1963– editor. | Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., editor.

  Title: The portable nineteenth-century African American women writers / edited with an introduction by Hollis Robbins and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. ; general editor, Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

  Description: New York : Penguin Books, 2017. | Series: Penguin Classics

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017004173 | ISBN 9780143105992 (paperback)

  Subjects: LCSH: American literature—African American authors. | American literature—Women authors. | American literature—19th century. | African American women—Literary collections. | BISAC: FICTION / African American / General. | FICTION / Anthologies (multiple authors).

  Classification: LCC PS508.N3 P596 2017 | DDC 810.8/0928708996073—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017004173

  Cover photograph: Women’s League, Newport, R.I., Courtesy of the Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-51555.

  Version_2

  Contents

  About the Editors

  Title Page

  Copyright

  What Is an African American Classic? by HENRY LOUIS GATES, JR.

  Introduction by HOLLIS ROBBINS and HENRY LOUIS GATES, JR.

  Suggestions for Further Reading

  THE PORTABLE NINETEENTH-CENTURY AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMEN WRITERS

  PERSONAL ACCOUNTS OF ABOLITION AND FREEDOM

  1. Anonymous (no date)

  “Address to the Female Literary Association of Philadelphia, on Their First Anniversary: By a Member” (1832)

  2. Sojourner Truth (ca. 1797–1883)

  “Speech Delivered to Women’s Rights Convention in Akron Ohio” (1851)

  Anti-Slavery Bugle Version (1851)

  Frances D. Gage Version (1863)

  Selections on Western Settlement from Narrative of Sojourner Truth (1875)

  Petition to Congress.

  “Truths from Sojourner Truth”

  From The N.Y. Tribune. Sojourner Truth at Work.

  3. Mary Prince (ca. 1788–after 1833)

  Excerpt from The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave (1831)

  4. Nancy Prince (1799–after 1856)

  From A Narrative of the Life and Travels of Mrs. Nancy Prince (1850)

  5. Maria W. Stewart (ca. 1803–1879)

  “An Address Delivered at the African Masonic Hall” (1833)

  6. Sarah Mapps Douglass (Zillah) (1806–1882)

  “A Mother’s Love” (1832)

  7. Harriet Jacobs (1813–1897)

  “The Loophole of Retreat” from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)

  8. Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907)

  “The Secret History of Mrs. Lincoln’s Wardrobe in New York,” from Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House (1868)

  9. Eliza Potter (1820–after 1861)

  “New Orleans,” from A Hairdresser’s Experience in High Life (1859)

  10. Harriet Wilson (1825–1900)

  Selections from Our Nig (1859)

  Preface

  Chapter I: Mag Smith, My Mother.

  Chapter XII: The Winding Up of the Matter.

  11. Hannah Crafts/Bond (1826–after 1859)

  Selections from The Bondwoman’s Narrative (ca. 1858)

  Chapter 1: In Childhood

  Chapter 13: A Turn of the Wheel

  12. Sarah Parker Remond (1826–1894)

  “The Negroes in the United States of America” (1862)

  13. Louisa Picquet (ca. 1829–1896)

  “The Family Sold at Auction—Louisa Bought by a ‘New Orleans Gentleman,’ and What Came of it,” from The Octoroon (1861)

  FUGITIVES AND EMIGRANTS: MOVING WEST AND NORTH

  14. Mrs. John Little (no date)

  “Mrs. John Little,” from The Refugee: Narratives of Fugitive Slaves in Canada (1856)

  15. Mary Ann Shadd Cary (1823–1893)

  Selections from A Plea for Emigration, or, Notes of Canada West (1852)

  Settlements,—Dawn,—Elgin,—Institution,—Fugitive Home

  Political Rights—Election Law—Oath—Currency.

  16. Jennie Carter (Semper Fidelis) (ca. 1830–1881)

  “Letter from Nevada County: Mud Hill, September 2, 1868” (1868)

  “Letter from Nevada County: Mud Hill, September 12, 1868” (1868)

  17. Abby Fisher (ca. 1832–after 1881)

  Selections from What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking, Soups, Pickles, Preserves, Etc. (1881)

  Preface and Apology

  Jumberlie—A Creole Dish

  Oyster Gumbo Soup

  Tonic Bitters—A Southern Remedy for Invalids

  Sweet Cucumber Pickles

  Pap for Infant Diet

  NORTHERN WOMEN AND THE POST-WAR SOUTH

  18. Charlotte Forten Grimké (1837–1914)

  “Life on the Sea Islands” (1864)

  “Charles Sumner, On Seeing Some Pictures of the Interior of His House” (1874)

  “The Gathering of the Grand Army” (1890)

  19. Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin (1842–1924)r />
  “Address to the First National Conference of Colored Women” (1895)

  “An Open Letter to the Educational League of Georgia” (1889)

  20. Edmonia Goodelle Highgate (1844–1870)

  “A Spring Day Up the James” (1865)

  “Rainy-Day Ink Drops” (1865)

  “Neglected Opportunities” (1866)

  “On Horse Back—Saddle Dash, No. 1” (1866)

  MEMOIRS: LOOKING BACK

  21. Julia A. J. Foote (1823–1900)

  Selections from A Brand Plucked from the Fire (1879)

  Chapter I: Birth and Parentage

  Chapter IV: My Teacher Hung for Crime

  Chapter XIX: Public Effort—Excommunication

  Chapter XXII: A Visit to My Parents—Further Labors

  22. Jarena Lee (1783–1855)

  Selection from Religious Experience and Journal of Mrs. Jarena Lee, Giving an Account of Her Call to Preach the Gospel (1849)

  My Call to Preach the Gospel.

  23. Zilpha Elaw (1790–after 1845)

  Selection from Memoirs of the Life, Religious Experience, Ministerial Travels and Labours of Mrs. Zilpha Elaw, an American Female of Colour (1846)

  24. Lucy Delaney (ca. 1830–after 1891)

  Selections from From Darkness Cometh the Light (1891)

  Chapter IV.

  Chapter V.

  25. Ella Sheppard (1851–1914)

  “Historical Sketch of the Jubilee Singers” (1911)

  POETRY, DRAMA, AND FICTION

  26. Sarah Forten Purvis (Magawisca) (1814–1884)

  “The Slave Girl’s Address to Her Mother” (1831)

  “The Abuse of Liberty” (1831)

  “Lines” (1838)

  27. Ann Plato (ca. 1820–after 1841)

  “Education” (1841)

  “The Natives of America” (1841)

  28. Julia Collins (unknown–1865)

  Selections from The Curse of Caste; or The Slave Bride (1865)

  Chapter VI.

  Chapter VIII: The Flower Fadeth.

  Chapter X: Richard in New Orleans.

  Chapter XXVII: Mrs. Butterworth’s Revelation.

  Chapter XXIX: Convalescent.

  29. Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825–1911)

  “Enlightened Motherhood: An Address Before the Brooklyn Literary Society, November 15, 1892”

  Newfound Poems from Forest Leaves (ca. 1840)

  “Haman and Mordecai”

  “A Dream”

  “The Felon’s Dream”

  Later Poems

  “Eliza Harris”

  “The Slave Auction”

  “Lines”

  “Bible Defence of Slavery”

  “The Drunkard’s Child”

  “The Revel”

  “Ethiopia”

  “To Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe”

  “The Fugitive’s Wife”

  “An Appeal to My Countrywomen”

  30. Pauline Hopkins (1859–1930)

  Selections from Peculiar Sam, or, the Underground Railroad, a Musical Drama in Four Acts (1879)

  Act III

  Act IV

  “Talma Gordon” (1900)

  31. Katherine Davis Chapman Tillman (Kate D. Chapman) (1870–after 1922)

  “A Question of To-day” (1889)

  “Lines to Ida B. Wells” (1894)

  “A Tribute to Negro Regiments” (1898)

  32. Amelia E. Johnson (ca. 1858–1922)

  Selections from Clarence and Corinne, or God’s Way (1890)

  Chapter I: Discouraged.

  Chapter IV: Provided For.

  33. Mary E. Ashe Lee (1850–1932)

  “Afmerica” (1885)

  34. H. Cordelia Ray (1849–1916)

  “Lincoln” (1876)

  “To My Father” (1893)

  “Shakespeare” (1893)

  “In Memoriam (Frederick Douglass)” (1897)

  “William Lloyd Garrison” (1905)

  35. Sarah E. Farro (1859–after 1937)

  Chapter 1 from True Love: A Story of English Domestic Life (1891)

  36. Alice Ruth Moore Dunbar-Nelson (1875–1935)

  “The Woman” (1895)

  “Amid the Roses” (1895)

  “I Sit and Sew” (1918)

  “Sonnet” (1919)

  “To the Negro Farmers of the United States” (1920)

  “To Madame Curie” (1921)

  WOMEN ADDRESSING WOMEN: ADDRESSES AND ESSAYS

  37. Sarah J. Early (1825–1907)

  “The Organized Efforts of the Colored Women of the South to Improve Their Condition” (1894)

  38. Lucy Craft Laney (1854–1933)

  “The Burden of the Educated Colored Woman” (1899)

  39. Fannie Barrier Williams (1855–1944)

  “The Intellectual Progress of the Colored Woman of the United States since the Emancipation Proclamation” (1893)

  40. Virginia W. Broughton (1856–1934)

  “Woman’s Work” (1894)

  41. Anna Julia Cooper (1860–1964)

  “Womanhood a Vital Element in the Regeneration and Progress of a Race” (1886)

  “Paper by Mrs. Anna J. Cooper” (1894)

  42. Mary Church Terrell (1863–1954)

  “The Progress of Colored Women” (1898)

  “The Convict Lease System and the Chain Gangs” (1907)

  43. Mary V. Cook (1863–1945)

  “Women’s Place in the Work of the Denomination” (1887)

  EDUCATION AND SOCIAL REFORM

  44. Julia Caldwell-Frazier (1863–1929)

  “The Decisions of Time” (1889)

  45. Fanny M. Jackson Coppin (1837–1913)

  “Commencement Address” (1876)

  A Race’s Progress.

  “Christmas Eve Story” (1880)

  “A Plea for the Mission School” (1891)

  “A Plea for Industrial Opportunity” (1879)

  46. Victoria Earle Matthews (1861–1907)

  “The Value of Race Literature” (1895)

  47. Gertrude Bustill Mossell (1855–1948)

  “Baby Bertha’s Temperance Lesson” (1885)

  “Will the Negro Share the Glory That Awaits Africa?” (1893)

  48. Amelia L. Tilghman (1856–1931)

  “Dedicated to Her Gracious Majesty, Queen Victoria, of England” (1892)

  49. Josephine J. Turpin Washington (1861–1949)

  “A Great Danger” (1884)

  Annie Porter Excoriated.

  “The Province of Poetry” (1889)

  “Needs of Our Newspapers: Some Reasons for Their Existence” (1889)

  “Anglo Saxon Supremacy” (1890)

  50. Ida B. Wells-Barnett (1862–1931)

  “Our Women” (1887)

  “The Requirements of Southern Journalism” (1893)

  “Lynch Law and the Color Line” (1893)

  “Our Country’s Lynching Record” (1913)

  “The Ordeal of the ‘Solitary’: Mrs. Barnett Protests Against It” (1915)

  WOMEN MEMORIALIZING WOMEN

  51. S. Elizabeth Frazier (1864–1924)

  “Some Afro-American Women of Mark” (1892)

  52. Lucy Wilmot Smith (1861–1890)

  “Women as Journalists: Portraits and Sketches of a Few of the Women Journalists of the Race” (1889)

  Acknowledgments

  What Is an African American Classic?

  I have long nurtured a deep and abiding affection for the Penguin Classics, at least since I was an undergraduate at Yale. I used to imagine that my attraction for these books—grouped together, as a set, in some indepen
dent bookstores when I was a student, and perhaps even in some today—stemmed from the fact that my first-grade classmates, for some reason that I can’t recall, were required to dress as penguins in our annual all-school pageant, and perform a collective side-to-side motion that our misguided teacher thought she could choreograph into something meant to pass for a “dance.” Piedmont, West Virginia, in 1956, was a very long way from Penguin Nation, wherever that was supposed to be! But penguins we were determined to be, and we did our level best to avoid wounding each other with our orange-colored cardboard beaks while stomping out of rhythm in our matching orange, veined webbed feet. The whole scene was madness, one never to be repeated at the Davis Free School. But I never stopped loving penguins. And I have never stopped loving the very audacity of the idea of the Penguin Classics, an affordable, accessible library of the most important and compelling texts in the history of civilization, their black-and-white spines and covers and uniform type giving each text a comfortable, familiar feel, as if we have encountered it, or its cousins, before. I think of the Penguin Classics as the very best and most compelling in human thought, an Alexandrian library in paperback, enclosed in black and white.

  I still gravitate to the Penguin Classics when killing time in an airport bookstore, deferring the slow torture of the security lines. Sometimes I even purchase two or three, fantasizing that I can speed-read one of the shorter titles, then make a dent in the longer one, vainly attempting to fill the holes in the liberal arts education that our degrees suggest we have, over the course of a plane ride! Mark Twain once quipped that a classic is “something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read,” and perhaps that applies to my airport purchasing habits. For my generation, these titles in the Penguin Classics form the canon—the canon of the texts that a truly well-educated person should have read, and read carefully and closely, at least once. For years I rued the absence of texts by black authors in this series, and longed to be able to make even a small contribution to the diversification of this astonishingly universal list. I watched with great pleasure as titles by African American and African authors began to appear, some two dozen over the past several years. So when Elda Rotor approached me about editing a series of African American classics and collections for Penguin’s Portable Series, I eagerly accepted.

  Thinking about the titles appropriate for inclusion in these series led me, inevitably, to think about what, for me, constitutes a “classic.” And thinking about this led me, in turn, to the wealth of reflections on what defines a work of literature or philosophy somehow speaking to the human condition beyond time and place, a work somehow endlessly compelling, generation upon generation, a work whose author we don’t have to look like to identify with, to feel at one with, as we find ourselves transported through the magic of a textual time machine; a work that refracts the image of ourselves that we project onto it, regardless of our ethnicity, our gender, our time, our place. This is what centuries of scholars and writers have meant when they use the word classic, and—despite all that we know about the complex intersubjectivity of the production of meaning in the wondrous exchange between a reader and a text—it remains true that classic texts, even in the most conventional, conservative sense of the word classic, do exist, and these books will continue to be read long after the generation the text reflects and defines, the generation of readers contemporary with the text’s author, is dead and gone. Classic texts speak from their authors’ graves, in their names, in their voices. As Italo Calvino once remarked, “A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.”