While the likes of Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Robert E. Lee have received the attention of thousands of authors and historians, collectively, Frederick Douglass is the subject of relatively few full biographies.
Douglass—a slave who escaped to freedom and became a celebrated orator, abolitionist, suffragist, and civil rights advocate—is perhaps the single greatest example of a 19th-century American who typified the trials and consequences of his time. And yet, while modern scholarship addresses Douglass and communicates his story alongside larger explanations of contemporaries living in the same era as he, his full life’s tale has largely been ignored.
Douglass—a slave who escaped to freedom and became a celebrated orator, abolitionist, suffragist, and civil rights advocate—is perhaps the single greatest example of a 19th-century American who typified the trials and consequences of his time. And yet, while modern scholarship addresses Douglass and communicates his story alongside larger explanations of contemporaries living in the same era as he, his full life’s tale has largely been ignored.
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Soon, thanks to the efforts of Dr. David W. Blight, that will change.
Blight, the Class of 1954 Professor of American History at Yale University and director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition, is in the process of completing a full biography of Douglass, which will reportedly be released in late 2017. To date, the publication has not received a confirmed title. In a lecture called “DOUGLASS! DOUGLASS! Writing the Life of Frederick Douglass: Why, and Why Now?” delivered at Harvard Law School on Nov. 9, Blight detailed his research and writing processes, as well as his reasons for writing a Douglass biography now. (It is worth noting that Blight’s lecture was delivered one day following the recent presidential election, and therefore features some intriguing analysis with regard to Frederick Douglass’ reactions to presidential elections in his lifetime, particularly the reelection of Lincoln in 1864.) |
An 1855 engraving of Frederick Douglass by J.C. Buttre, based on a daguerretotype (Miller, Orton & Mulligan/Wikimedia Commons)
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Six or seven years ago, Blight recalled, he was “blindly lucky.” While visiting Savannah to give a lecture to the Georgia Historical Society, Blight was introduced to Walter Evans, a retired surgeon and art collector who has in his possession a wealth of Douglass material, which, according to Blight, “almost no one had ever used.” In ten large scrapbooks, Evans showed Blight thousands of documents which had been collected and preserved by Douglass’ children, including newspaper clippings, family letters, marriage certificates, photographs, and a handwritten memoir authored by one of Douglass’ sons.
While Blight had not anticipated working on a full-length study of Douglass—about whom he has already written scores of articles, lectures, and an intellectual biography—he reasoned that the opportunity was too good to ignore. Now, after more than five years, as of November, Blight was working on the 31st (and final) chapter of the biography.
While Blight had not anticipated working on a full-length study of Douglass—about whom he has already written scores of articles, lectures, and an intellectual biography—he reasoned that the opportunity was too good to ignore. Now, after more than five years, as of November, Blight was working on the 31st (and final) chapter of the biography.
Dr. David W. Blight (www.davidwblight.com)
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Especially significant, said Blight, is the plethora of material in the Evans’ collection regarding the last third of Douglass’ life, as well as his views on several personal issues, including religion and apparently complicated relationships with women. Up to this point, even with Douglass’ three autobiographies, several pieces of his life were seemingly missing.
“It opens up the last third of Douglass’ life as never before…,” said Blight. “Douglass is so famous because of overcoming slavery. Being a slave, and becoming free, is in some ways more dramatic than being free,” at least according to scholarship on Douglass to this point. In the last decades of his life, Blight continued, “we get a Douglass who is often deemed ‘out of touch.’ He’s getting old. He’s always getting in…fights with other black leaders….But that last third has for me become his most fascinating of all. It’s the aging man, the old man, the man of fame and celebrity.” Blight added that the material pertaining to this portion of Douglass’ life adds “thousands of pieces of texture” to historians’ understanding of such an influential and complex historical figure. |
Central to the life of Douglass, Blight said, is the story of “an outsider” who “became an insider.” This theme will be explored throughout the biography, with a special emphasis on answering the questions of “what kind of insider” Douglass was, “and what does that mean?” Or put another way, Blight further noted, “How does an uncompromising radical”—an “angry and bitter black man…who comes to see himself in a prophetic tradition”—“become a pragmatic politician inside of power?”
Additionally, Blight emphasized the importance of exploring Douglass’ use of rhetoric. Blight spent substantial time throughout his research searching for the origins of where Douglass learned to find and utilize “the music of language” so eloquently.
Additionally, Blight emphasized the importance of exploring Douglass’ use of rhetoric. Blight spent substantial time throughout his research searching for the origins of where Douglass learned to find and utilize “the music of language” so eloquently.
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Above all else, a full monograph of Douglass unavoidably has to focus on his involvement in the central event of the mid-19th century, and the most significant life event for all who lived through it—the Civil War.
“What kind of a revolution was the Civil War, emancipation, and Reconstruction in American life, and how do you answer it through the life of Douglass?” asked Blight, rhetorically. “That may be the biggest thing of all; it’s kind of what interests people about Douglass," Blight continued. "There he sits: he’s born in the 18-teens, before there are steamboats, and he dies after Edison has made recording devices….But in the middle of his life is this big thing—The Civil War—which meant everything to his own identity, and his own meaning. It’s at the heart of any attempt to explain him.” |
"Frederick Douglass appealing to President Lincoln and his cabinet to enlist Negroes," by William Edouard Scott (Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Library of Congress)
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David Blight’s examination of the life of Frederick Douglass has the potential to be a landmark biography. Blight is one of the foremost social historians of the Civil War and its place in American memory, and Douglass is predominant amongst influential social figures of the 19th century. The combination of the two—the one telling the other’s story, perhaps with more depth than has ever been accomplished—will likely be a noteworthy addition to the ever-growing assortment of Civil War era studies.
Further information:
There has not yet been any word on the release date of Blight’s biography of Douglass, but in the meantime, there are several titles to whet the palate of curious learners, including Blight’s intellectual biography, “Frederick Douglass’ Civil War: Keeping Faith in Jubilee” (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1991), which details “Douglass’ development of a social identity in relation to transforming events, and demonstrates that he saw the Civil War as the Second American Revolution.” William S. McFeely’s “Frederick Douglass” (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1991), is the most recent full biography of Douglass.
Just last year, John Stauffer, Zoe Trodd, and Celeste-Marie Bernier compiled and released “Picturing Frederick Douglass: An Illustrated Biography of the Nineteenth Century’s Most Photographed American” (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2015), which features 160 images of Douglass captured between 1841 and 1895.
Lately, dual biographies of Douglass and Lincoln have been popular, best exemplified by James Oakes’ “The Radical and the Republican: Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery Politics” (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007), and “Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln” (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2008).
The most valuable contributions to the bibliography of Douglass materials are the words of the man himself. Most prominent among these are his three separate autobiographies, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” (originally published in 1845), “My Bondage and My Freedom” (1855), and “Life and Times of Frederick Douglass” (1881). Additionally, several of his public addresses and other personal writings are available via online repositories, such as TeachingAmericanHistory.org.
Just last year, John Stauffer, Zoe Trodd, and Celeste-Marie Bernier compiled and released “Picturing Frederick Douglass: An Illustrated Biography of the Nineteenth Century’s Most Photographed American” (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2015), which features 160 images of Douglass captured between 1841 and 1895.
Lately, dual biographies of Douglass and Lincoln have been popular, best exemplified by James Oakes’ “The Radical and the Republican: Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery Politics” (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007), and “Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln” (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2008).
The most valuable contributions to the bibliography of Douglass materials are the words of the man himself. Most prominent among these are his three separate autobiographies, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” (originally published in 1845), “My Bondage and My Freedom” (1855), and “Life and Times of Frederick Douglass” (1881). Additionally, several of his public addresses and other personal writings are available via online repositories, such as TeachingAmericanHistory.org.
View the lecture at Harvard School of Law, referenced above:
View a lecture Blight delivered in 2013 at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, titled "From Days of Mourning to Days of Jubilee? Frederick Douglass and the Meaning of the Civil War":
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