#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A chorus of extraordinary voices tells the epic story of the four-hundred-year journey of African Americans from 1619 to the present—edited by Ibram X. Kendi, author of How to Be an Antiracist, and Keisha N. Blain, author of Set the World on Fire.
“A
vital addition to [the] curriculum on race in America . . . a gateway
to the solo works of all the voices in Kendi and Blain’s impressive
choir.”—The Washington Post
“From journalist
Hannah P. Jones on Jamestown's first slaves to historian Annette
Gordon-Reed’s portrait of Sally Hemings to the seductive cadences of
poets Jericho Brown and Patricia Smith, Four Hundred Souls weaves a tapestry of unspeakable suffering and unexpected transcendence.”—O: The Oprah Magazine
The story begins in 1619—a year before the Mayflower—when the White Lion disgorges
“some 20-and-odd Negroes” onto the shores of Virginia, inaugurating the
African presence in what would become the United States. It takes us to
the present, when African Americans, descendants of those on the White Lion and
a thousand other routes to this country, continue a journey defined by
inhuman oppression, visionary struggles, stunning achievements, and
millions of ordinary lives passing through extraordinary history.
Four Hundred Souls is
a unique one-volume “community” history of African Americans. The
editors, Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain, have assembled ninety
brilliant writers, each of whom takes on a five-year period of that
four-hundred-year span. The writers explore their periods through a
variety of techniques: historical essays, short stories, personal
vignettes, and fiery polemics. They approach history from various
perspectives: through the eyes of towering historical icons or the
untold stories of ordinary people; through places, laws, and objects.
While themes of resistance and struggle, of hope and reinvention, course
through the book, this collection of diverse pieces from ninety
different minds, reflecting ninety different perspectives, fundamentally
deconstructs the idea that Africans in America are a monolith—instead
it unlocks the startling range of experiences and ideas that have always
existed within the community of Blackness.
This is a history
that illuminates our past and gives us new ways of thinking about our
future, written by the most vital and essential voices of our present.
