The North Carolina Roots of African American Literature

“A welcome effort to take more substantive scholarly note of North Carolina’s centrality to African American literature. . . . North Carolina’s complexities and contradictions are elegantly illustrated.” — Journal of Southern History

“Thoughtful, comprehensive and very readable. . . . Andrew’s persuasive explanation of the importance of these North Carolina authors and his collection of their important works into this accessible volume is a gift.” — D.G. Martin, Chapel Hill News

“This important anthology shows that North Carolina produced a remarkable, indeed unmatched record of black authorship throughout the nineteenth century. . . . Even if these eight writers were not North Carolinians, a collection of their writings makes for a compelling display of diverse African American literary expression during the first decades after slavery. The fact that these writers were all North Carolinians makes the volume even more impressive, as it points to the fact that they were all shaped by the cultural forces of this particular state during a time of tremendous political and social upheaval.” — Lucinda H. MacKethan, North Carolina State University