A biographical study of famed abolitionist Frederick Douglass through his relationships with the women in his life that reveals the man from both a political/public and private perspective.

The critically acclaimed author of Voodoo Dreams delivers an inspired work of historical fiction about the warring passions that drove the great abolitionist Frederick Douglass and two women -- one black, one white -- who loved him. Douglass' Women reimagines the lives of an American hero, Frederick Douglass, and two women -- his wife and his mistress -- who loved him and lived in his shadow. Anna Douglass, a free woman of color, was Douglass' wife of forty-four years, who bore him five children. Ottilie Assing, a German-Jewish intellectual, provided him the companionship of the mind that he needed. Hurt by Douglass' infidelity, Anna rejected his notion that only literacy freed the mind. For her, familial love rivaled intellectual pursuits. Ottilie was raised by parents who embraced the ideal of free love, but found herself entrapped in an unfulfilling love triangle with America's most famous self-taught slave for nearly three decades. In her finest novel to date, Jewell Parker Rhodes vividly resurrects these two extraordinary women from history, portraying the life they led together under the same roof of the Douglass home. Here, fiery emotions of passion, jealousy, and resentment churn as the women discover an uneasy solidarity in shared love for an exceptional and powerful man. Douglass' Women fills the gaps and silences that history has left in an unforgettable epic full of heartache and triumph.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1876.

- This book contains custom design elements for each chapter. This classic of American literature, a dramatic autobiography of the early life of an American slave, was first published in 1845, when its author had just achieved his freedom. Its shocking first-hand account of the horrors of slavery became an international best seller. His eloquence led Frederick Douglass to become the first great African-American leader in the United States. • Douglass rose through determination, brilliance and eloquence to shape the American Nation. • He was an abolitionist, human rights and women’s rights activist, orator, author, journalist, publisher and social reformer • His personal relationship with Abraham Lincoln helped persuade the President to make emancipation a cause of the Civil War.

Frederick Douglass’s changeable sense of his own life story is reflected in his many conflicting accounts of events during his journey from slavery to freedom. Robert S. Levine creates a fascinating collage of this elusive subject—revisionist biography at its best, offering new perspectives on Douglass the social reformer, orator, and writer.

* Selected as One of the Best Books of the 21st Century by The New York Times * Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in History * “Extraordinary…a great American biography” (The New Yorker) of the most important African American of the 19th century: Frederick Douglass, the escaped slave who became the greatest orator of his day and one of the leading abolitionists and writers of the era. As a young man Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) escaped from slavery in Baltimore, Maryland. He was fortunate to have been taught to read by his slave owner mistress, and he would go on to become one of the major literary figures of his time. His very existence gave the lie to slave owners: with dignity and great intelligence he bore witness to the brutality of slavery. Initially mentored by William Lloyd Garrison, Douglass spoke widely, using his own story to condemn slavery. By the Civil War, Douglass had become the most famed and widely travelled orator in the nation. In his unique and eloquent voice, written and spoken, Douglass was a fierce critic of the United States as well as a radical patriot. After the war he sometimes argued politically with younger African Americans, but he never forsook either the Republican party or the cause of black civil and political rights. In this “cinematic and deeply engaging” (The New York Times Book Review) biography, David Blight has drawn on new information held in a private collection that few other historian have consulted, as well as recently discovered issues of Douglass’s newspapers. “Absorbing and even moving…a brilliant book that speaks to our own time as well as Douglass’s” (The Wall Street Journal), Blight’s biography tells the fascinating story of Douglass’s two marriages and his complex extended family. “David Blight has written the definitive biography of Frederick Douglass…a powerful portrait of one of the most important American voices of the nineteenth century” (The Boston Globe). In addition to the Pulitzer Prize, Frederick Douglass won the Bancroft, Parkman, Los Angeles Times (biography), Lincoln, Plutarch, and Christopher awards and was named one of the Best Books of 2018 by The New York Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, The San Francisco Chronicle, and Time.

"Adler, a prolific children's book author, has done a good job describing the trajectory of Douglass's life as he moved from being a slave himself to being a freer of slaves and a tireless civil rights activist. Narrator Charles Turner, who has a deep and resonant voice, uses just the right matter-of-fact yet serious tones that won't overwhelm young listeners but will make an impression on them." -AudioFile