North Carolina Slave Narratives: The Lives of Moses Roper, Lunsford Lane, Moses Grandy, and Thomas H. Jones Book

I've read some of these particular narratives before, and they continue to strike notes of compassion and outrage. The stories of these enslaved people illustrate the the cruelties, indignities, and dehumanization that Americans inflicted on black people just a century and a half ago. We have never made significant efforts toward reparations and, in fact, have replaced slavery with other indignities. And large numbers of white people are nostalgic for the Old South - deplorable! These stories and others like them should be required reading in all schools.

The introductions (to the book and each story) trace the history of the slave narrative, its place in the abolitionist movement, and its later continuing popularity as a tearjerker genre. Interesting.