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Jan 12, 2014lukasevansherman rated this title 3 out of 5 stars
Along with Frederick Douglass's "Narrative" and DuBois's "The Souls of Black Folks," Booker T. Washington's "Up From Slavery" is one of the most important books of African-American non-fiction of the post-slavery era. An influential educator and advocate for black rights, Washington is a polarizing figure because more radical African-Americans (such as DuBois) accused him of compromise and being overly deferential to whites. There's certainly none of the anger you'll find in Douglass or none of the horrors of slave narratives, but I think Washington did the best he could given the circumstances and this is a milestone in both African-American writing and cultural progress.