ME FIRST! "The Known World" by Edward P. Jones

She may be good at getting in the last word, but I'll take the first word on this one - I've been reading "The Known World" by Edward P. Jones. It won the Pulitzer prize back in 2004, and though it is one of the "slavery" novels on the list, I'm taken by it. Jones' writing is complicated, but woven together in a way that brings the story's many characters into a sharp focus that might not have been possible had another author attempted to write it. 

The story - Its premise is one that makes pundits salivate - is one that should make people of all stripes sit up, put down what they're doing, and take notice. In fact, I would have thought its premise would have caused more of a stir when it was published. Apart from its awards and acclaim, though, it seems to have been little more than a popular "blip" on the national radar.

So, what is this great premise? Nothing less than the idea that free black Americans, former slaves and free men who came to the United States as immigrants could, and did, own slaves themselves. Huh. Whoda thunkit? 

While the book is a fictional account of slavery in the commonwealth of Virginia in the early 1800s, it makes you want to learn more about what exactly really happened back then- makes you almost want to take that time machine back to see if what we've been told all these years is real. Was this possible? As it turns out, the answer is yes, and there are historical accounts to back it up. While it's true that the actual percentage of black slaveholders in the 1800s was so infinitesimal as to be nearly not worth considering, (~2% according to the 1830 federal census, or 3,777 individuals) it does shed some light onto the way people thought two hundred years ago, after removing the "20/20 vision" goggles that so many of us wear when we look back at what has come to be resoundingly seen as a great smudge on the reputation of the United States of America.

What the book brings to light is that slavery was not in itself a wholly one-sided affair. When you begin to dig deeper, you begin to realize that there were slaves throughout the founding of the United States that fell into every category of race. Some were simply called "indentured servants," a slightly more P.C. way of saying "slave." Of course, the lesson best taught by "The Known World" is that slavery is a part of all of our history, so long as we call ourselves Americans, and to claim it from all sides of the issue, not just the sides that the media and (ridiculously) biased history textbooks tell us we should be  is to finally accept that part of our past, and move forward a stronger nation because of it.

And she thought I couldn't be an adult about this! :p