Sojourner Truth: A Life, a Symbol

New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1996. R6 - A first edition (stated with complete numberline) hardcover book SIGNED and inscribed by Nell Painter on the half-title page in very good condition in good dust jacket that is mylar protected. Dust jacket has wrinkling, chipping and crease on the edges and corners, light soiled patches on some bottom edges, scatteerd scratches, rubbing, light wrinkling and scuffing, light tanning and shelf wear. Book has some bumped corners and light edgewear, some wrinkling on the spine edges, some scattered stains on the page edges, light discoloration and shelf wear. 9.5"x6.5", 370 pages. Satisfaction Guaranteed. Sojourner Truth was an American abolitionist of New York Dutch heritage and activist for African-American civil rights, women's rights, and alcohol temperance. Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, New York, but escaped with her infant daughter to freedom in 1826. After going to court to recover her son in 1828, she became the first black woman to win such a case against a white man. She gave herself the name Sojourner Truth in 1843 after she became convinced that God had called her to leave the city and go into the countryside "testifying to the hope that was in her." Her best-known speech was delivered extemporaneously, in 1851, at the Ohio Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio. The speech became widely known during the Civil War by the title "Ain't I a Woman?", a variation of the original speech that was published in 1863 as being spoken in a stereotypical Black dialect, then more commonly spoken in the South. Sojourner Truth, however, was from New York and grew up speaking Dutch as her first language. During the Civil War, Truth helped recruit black troops for the Union Army; after the war, she tried unsuccessfully to secure land grants from the federal government for formerly enslaved people (summarized as the promise of "forty acres and a mule"). She continued to fight on behalf of women and African Americans until her death. As her biographer Nell Irvin Painter wrote, "At a time when most Americans thought of slaves as male and women as white, Truth embodied a fact that still bears repeating: Among the blacks are women; among the women, there are blacks." A memorial bust of Truth was unveiled in 2009 in Emancipation Hall in the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center. She is the first African American woman to have a statue in the Capitol building. In 2014, Truth was included in Smithsonian magazine's list of the "100 Most Significant Americans of All Time." . Signed by Author. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good/Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.