Book's Name- Up From Slavery
Genre- Autobiography
Writer- Booker T. Washington
Number of Pages- 224
Publisher- Maple Press
Reviewer- Ravi Prakash
Pics Credit- Clicked by Self
Rating- 4/5
Rating- 4/5
I wanted to
read this autobiography since 2006. Why? As it happened, I got the chance to
read one of its chapters in my senior secondary class. The chapter was titled
as, “My Struggle For an Education”. I was very much impressed by the struggle
of this black man for getting an education. When I came in teaching profession,
I taught it many times to students and the desire to read this whole book
accompanied always with my earnest wishes’ list. At last I bought it and now I
own it.
First thing
that I want to say that this is an autobiography of a teacher and every teacher
who is devoted to his/her work should read it. It may be famous for the
inspiration to be great for the under-dogs or black men in the USA and world,
but it basically shows the devotion of a teacher to eradicate ignorance and
illiteracy, though the school which he established was mainly for the black but
the poor whites were also his students.
A boy born
as a slave among slaves at a plantation sight in Franklin County, Virginia,
somewhere in 1858 or 1859 as far as he could remember, lived and grew up there
in a log cabin of fourteen by sixteen feet square till the end of Civil War in
1865. After the Civil War, everyone was free, no one was slave and no one was
master, but the employment crisis was prevailed then in the plantation sights.
As his father had abandoned the family very soon after his birth and there was
only his mother and big brother, mother wasn’t in so healthful condition to
work in a salt or coal mine, thus in order to procure enough to feed themselves
they both had to work in mines since their childhood, one day while working in
the coal mine, he heard two laborers talking about a school for the black
somewhere in Virginia. At once he decided to go to that school without caring
how he would reach there. Somehow he got there; took admission, worked to pay
the fee and lodging and by his dedication and sincerity, he became the
favourite student of the institute’s best teacher General Samuel C. Armstrong.
Booker mentions General Armstrong as his inspiration.
The name of
the institute was Hampton Normal Agriculture Institute, where he worked,
studied, got degree and experience and made himself worthy to serve others.
Because the institute was not only for academic education but also for physical
labor, He says, “ At Hampton I not only learned that it was not a disgrace to
labor, but learned to love labor, not alone for its financial value, but for
labor’s own sake and for the independence and self-reliance which the ability
to do something which the world wants done brings.” This was the spirit that
led him to establish the great Tuskgee Institute and established him as a world
famous teacher and educator, the then situations were also demanding for such
activities. Recalling the period of Reconstruction from 1865 to 1878, in the
South, he describes- the ambition to secure an education was the most
praiseworthy and encouraging…in every part of the South, schools , both day and
night were filled to overflowing with people of all ages and condition, some
being as far along as sixty and seventy years old…the reason was that everyone
wanted to hold office-that was the temptation, may be also a political trick of
the North to punish the whites of the South who cooperated with the blacks in
the Civil War. This passion for learning then was only for Greek and Latin
while Booker thought that it was of no use for a black man who is unable to
feed him and his children, instead he emphasized on the training of, “Hand,
Head and Heart”.
Soon he got
the chance to educate young Native-Americans in Hampton and he accomplished it
with great patience. General Armstrong gave him another project- there was a
proposal to establish a normal school for African-American in Tuskgee, Alabama
and Gen Armstrong recommended Booker for this responsibility. In 1881, Booker
went there and found that it was a town consisting almost 2000 people mostly
Blacks, it was also regarded as the ‘Black Belt’ of the South- first for its
Black soil and second for its colored population. Situations were not favorable
to run a school there, it was very hard to find an open place, starting from a
Stable and Hen-house, just imagine what patience and hard work he would have to
go through to establish a multi-storey building for the school premises.
Tuskgee was a backward area and people there were mainly dependent for their
living on Agriculture, so Booker devised such methods of educating them that
benefitted him in the field with more production and in the mind with more
peace. All the basic skills to live peacefully were taught there, it was no
shame to labor for a brick-kiln or sweeping the room for any student. The whole
building of Tuskgee was made by its own students- an epitome of self-dependency.
There he met a co-teacher named Olivia A. Davidson who later became his wife
after the death of his first wife Fannie N. Smith. Apart from education and
inspection, Booker had also to travel for raising money, as there was a great
pressure on him for his school and students to succeed, for failure would
reflect poorly on the ability of the Black race and this gave him the chance to
introduce himself and to be introduced from the outer world and he was quite
surprised when many people admitted that they knew him on account of his great
work in Tuskgee.
Later,
Booker got chances to speak of his work and ideas on many platforms, the first
chance was at National Education Association where he spoke about the friendly
relation of both the races, the next ground-breaking address was the Atlanta
Exposition Address where he was invited as the representative of the Negro
race. The full speech is printed in the book, I just want to quote a few lines
of that address which seem important-
“No race can
prosper till it learns there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in
writing a poem.”
“The wisest
among my race understand that the agitation of questions of social justice is
the extremest folly, and that progress in the enjoyment of all the privileges
that will come to us must be the result of severe and constant struggle rather
than of artificial forcing. No race that has anything to contribute to the
markets of the world is long in any degree ostracized. It is important and
right that all privileges of the law be ours, but it is vastly more important
that we be prepared for the exercises of these privileges. The opportunity to
earn a dollar in factory now is worth infinitely more than the opportunity to
spend a dollar in an opera-house. ”
The Atlanta
Exposition Address gave him place in newspapers’ headlines and editorials and
he became famous as a great public-speaker and as the representative of his
race. Later, in 1893, he got the chance to travel Europe with his third wife
Miss Margaret James Murray, there he gave some addresses too and met some
prominent people like Queen Victoria and Susan B. Anthony, he also met one of
his friends Henry Tanner, an African-American artist. He had now everything
what an honest and devoted teacher can think of, full recognition of his
efforts, great fame, receiving an honorary degree from Howard University-the
first awarded to an African-American, and another great honor for Booker was
the visit of President William McKinley to the Tuskgee institute, an act which
the President hoped to impress upon citizens his, “interest and faith in the
race”. Booker ends his autobiography describing the then situation of Tuskgee
and his daily routine.
A nice book
indeed, written in a very easy language and simple style. This book, however,
was a best-seller and remained the most popular African-American autobiography
until that of Malcom X. In 1998, the Modern Library listed the book on No.3 on
its list of 100 best nonfiction of the 20th century and in 1999, it
was also listed by the conservative Intercollegiate Review as the ‘50 best
books of the 20th century’. (source- Wikipedia)
Some critics
call Booker T. Washington as the ‘accommodationist’ in the then situations
which demanded a more provocative approach. In the decades of 1880s and 1890s, the
majority of the whites, especially of the North thought that African-American men can’t
survive without the institution of slavery, a belief of, “black criminality and
moral decline” was all-pervading. When Booker started writing and public-speaking,
his first goal was to challenge this stereotype belief and to assert about a
possibility of improvement. In those situations when mob violence can easily be
provoked in the black belt, it wasn’t mindful to apply a provocative approach.
He was of the view to relax the tension not to exacerbate- it wasn’t
sheepish but a genuine practical approach.
April 1,
1901, The Washington Post describes Up From Slavery quite plainly: [Mr.
Washington’s] book is full of practical wisdom and sound common sense. It may
be read by the Black and White with profit alike. (source-Wikipedia)
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