The preeminent American slave narrative first published in 1845, Frederick Dougl
ass'sNarrative powerfully details the life of the abolitionist from his birth in
to slavery in 1818 to his escape to the North in 1838, how he endured the daily
physical and spiritual brutalities of his owners and driver, how he learned to r
ead and write, and how he grew into a man who could only live free or die. In ad
dition to Douglass's classic autobiography, this new edition also includes his m
ost famous speech What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" and his only known w
ork of fiction,The Heroic Slave, which was written, in part, as a response to Ha
rriet Beecher Stowe'sUncle Tom's Cabin.
