American Slavery, American Freedom, Edmund S. Morgan
American Slavery, American Freedom, Edmund S. Morgan
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American Slavery, American Freedom

Author: Edmund S. Morgan

Narrator: Sean Pratt

Unabridged: 14 hr 19 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Ascent Audio

Published: 02/19/2013


Synopsis

"If it is possible to understand the American paradox, the marriage of slavery and freedom, Virginia is surely the place to begin," writes Edmund S. Morgan in American Slavery, American Freedom, a study of the tragic contradiction at the core of America. Morgan finds the key to this central paradox in the people and politics of the state that was both the birthplace of the revolution and the largest slaveholding state in the country. With a new introduction. Winner of the Francis Parkman Prize and the Albert J. Beveridge Award.

About Edmund S. Morgan

Edmund S. Morgan is Sterling Professor of History Emeritus at Yale University and past president of the Organization of American Historians.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Joseph on June 07, 2015

This book is pretty dense and long, but it's a brilliant and even somewhat disturbing argument. Morgan's thesis is that the free, egalitarian Virginia that emerged in the 18th century had that freedom and stability largely because of slavery. In other words, the freedom of most white Virginians rest......more

Goodreads review by Porter on April 18, 2023

There are a few books in every field that are considered classics. Books that have become part of the story because the impact that they have had on the study of the subject itself. Edmund Morgan’s “American Slavery, American Freedom” is one of those books. Morgan won a Pultizer Prize for "for a cr......more

Goodreads review by Robert on February 23, 2013

This is a fantastic, must read book for anyone interested in the origins of American racism. Morgan recounts the cultural, economic and political evolution of the 17th and early 18th century Virginia, and with it, makes comprehensible the reasons why racial slavery emerged as an integral component t......more

Goodreads review by Barksdale on September 29, 2011

I had expected this book to address in detail the role of slavery in colonial America, but to my surprise it presents by far the most lucid account I have read of the first 100 years of the Virginia colony. During those early years, slavery was rare (although legal). The book recounts the economic c......more