Morbid Romantic

Book Review & Personal Blog

Title: Freedom at Risk: The Kidnapping of Free Blacks in America, 1780-1865
Author(s): Carol Wilson
Genre: Nonfiction – American
Finished: February 26, 2011
Rating: 3.5 Stars

In Freedom at Risk, Carol Wilson notes that though there is a substantial body of scholarship devoted to the diverse experiences of African Americans before the Civil War, little of it has focused on free blacks who occupied such precarious social and legal positions that their freedom was always under threat. Wilson’s contribution to the field aims to address this gap she identifies, discussing the kidnapping of free blacks into slavery (1). Arranged by topic into a small and compact five chapters, Wilson examines the various characteristics of direct abduction, kidnappers who used the law to facilitate their activities, government initiatives toward aiding free blacks either under threat of or already kidnapped into slavery, abolitionist work toward aiding and securing freedom and more safeguards for free blacks, and finally the ways in which blacks in their communities tried to protect themselves and others. Wilson acknowledges from the start that her sources in no way reflect the prevalence of kidnappings because records of most simply do not exist (6). However limited Wilson found sources to be during her research, she employs a variety of published and unpublished source material, both primary and secondary. Most of her unpublished primary sources come from areas in border states or in the north, mainly Pennsylvania and Delaware, as do only but a few of her many newspaper sources. The use of slave narratives allows Wilson to account for other areas throughout the nation. Wilson justifies her heavy usage of information from Pennsylvania and Delaware with the claim that these states along with Maryland were where the majority of kidnappings occurred due to the greater percentage of free blacks living there than anywhere else in the country (10-11). Whether this is in total number or percentage relative the white population, Wilson does not state. Additionally, the statement that certain areas saw the majority of kidnappings presents difficulty considering the mention that sources are overall very scarce, and Wilson does not make any attempt prove the point. The information from which to know what was truly going on elsewhere, especially in the South, is simply not available. Otherwise, Wilson is very good at reading the information that is available to her, and never gives too much weight to certain facts or stretches her limited facts beyond reasonable interpretation.

It is through her usage of slave narratives and accounts that Wilson breathes real and intriguing life into a book that could all too easily fall to technical statements of numbers and legal proceedings. The stories used by Wilson state better than numbers that free blacks everywhere, no matter their age or social standing, ran the risk of possible abduction into slavery. Wilson does miss the opportunity, as reviewer Shirley J. Yee correctly identifies, to dive deeper into the diversity of African American life by looking at how class differences and community standing gave some blacks better protection and legal recourse.¹ To do so, however, would have caused Wilson to deviate from her intent to show that even well-standing, relatively rich free black members of a community lived under the persistent threat that they would be kidnapped and enslaved (107, 117-118). In this way there was a shared black experience throughout the country that did not allow blacks to obtain special privilege no matter their position, wealth, or reputation. Wilson does not try to psychoanalyze the kidnappers. The very intimate and personal nature of the crime of kidnapping and human selling could all too easily lead to a digression toward hypotheticals of how a person could engage in the practice, but Wilson stays to her two motivations: racism and greed (16-17). No doubt every kidnapper had his or her own reasons for what they did, but Wilson goes with the facts and allows them to speak for themselves. Though it is good that Wilson does not laden her text down with technical details so that it maintains an interesting and narrative flow, she still would have benefitted from the inclusion of some numbers and data. Multiple times throughout the book Wilson makes quantitative analyses such as that Pennsylvania and Delaware had the highest number of free black citizens and also the highest number of free black kidnappings, yet she provides nothing solid in the form of data to substantiate her claim.

One of Wilson’s greatest successes is her ability to take the complex political and legal landscape of the time and synthesize it down into small understandable parts fused with social context and examples. Wilson not only identifies how the all-encompassing federal laws such as the Fugitive Slave Acts facilitated the kidnapping of free blacks into slavery, even delving into the Constitution as the root of fugitive slave laws, but also narrows her focus to look at how local and state laws worked against the free black population to see to their enslavement. For example, Wilson informs the reader that a black charged of any crime could be legally sold into slavery to pay their court and imprisonment debts even if found innocent (41). Therefore, Wilson’s scope looks beyond instances of direct abduction as the only means through which a free black could be sent into slavery, broadening the scope of what kidnapping means. Wilson’s book does, however, suffer from repetition. She has a habit throughout the book of repeating information that she has already given. For instance, she states in her chapter on kidnappers who worked within established laws that Southern states had laws that forbid free blacks from entering. Then, a few pages later, she restates the same fact (41 & 57). The fact of greed bring a primary motivating force is also repeated numerous times to the point of it being excessive (2, 17, 36, 65). Wilson also digresses from her focus in the last chapter on black resistance to kidnapping by drawing an ambiguous line in some cases between free blacks who were captured and compelled into slavery, and fugitive slaves who were captured by dishonest means. Wilson even recognizes that she is doing so, and states that in most cases it is not clear who was free and who was fugitive slave, but the point is to illustrate that slave catchers paid no heed for the law and seized both as the opportunity allowed regardless of the law (115). It is understandable, given the limited evidence that Wilson had to work from, and considering that most black organizations worked toward both the protection of free blacks and fugitive slaves, that the two would be linked together in this instance. Overall, the book presents a brief glimpse into one of many various injustices blacks faced in pre-Civil War America. It is impressive that Wilson was able to include so much information, from the social to the political, dotted with a plethora of examples and real life accounts, to make a book as informative as it is engaging.
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Disclaimer(s):

- More can be found in my Reviews section.
- If you would like me to review your book, send an email to me at morbidromantic@gmail.com. Read my Book Review Policy for more information.

1. Shirley J. Yee, Review [Untitled], Society for Historians of the Early American Republic 15, no. 2 (Summer, 1995), 319. [↩]

Title: Celia, a Slave
Author(s): Melton A. McLaurin
Genre: Nonfiction- American
Finished: February 10, 2011
Rating: 3 Stars

Rejecting the big man and big event approach many historians adopt when defining any era, Melton A. McLaurin uses the story of a young slave girl accused of murdering her white master in Celia, a Slave to illustrate what he calls the “major issues” of the pre-Civil War period. Melton admits from the start that Celia’s story, in fact, reveals little about slavery as a broad institution. Instead, what he presents is a case study in the “fundamental moral anxiety” produced by slavery, which he feels has been ignored by historians who focus on social or economic aspects of slavery, and therefore need not confront the more intimate moral issues blacks and whites faced daily when participating in an institution that dehumanized one group for the sake of the other. Melton’s task is made all the more difficult by the fact that evidence and sources are scant, and discloses from the start that a lot of his story will be based on assumptions or inferences. Milton states that he will do this with the sensitivity of a storyteller, giving readers a flowing and engaging narrative that avoids what he calls the “dry and dull” history others fall into the trap of (vii, ix-x).

That is not to say that McLaurin’s narrative is void any detail of politics and economy. Since the book itself, taking place in 1855 Missouri, centers on the continual rape of the slave Celia, then the murder of her master Robert Newsome, and finally Celia’s trial, McLaurin cannot avoid including political facets of slave life and slave status. To inform the reader, McLaurin scatters his book with interesting facts of slave legality such as that slaves were considered property, and as a result masters could not be guilty of rape since a man could hardly “trespass” on his own property (93). In addition, McLaurin very nicely frames the intimate events that make up the focus on the book within a larger national context. Featured very heavily throughout Celia is the tumultuous Nebraska-Kansas Act, which threatened the institution of slavery in bordering Missouri where Celia lived. The political climate of the time, especially one so important to Missouri, demonstrates to the reader just why the murder of a white man by a slave, no matter for what reason, was so intolerable. McLaurin then proceeds to describe ramifications of the Celia case more important to Missouri and the power dynamic of slavery than the more famous Dred Scott case (95). McLaurin also finds it essential to illuminate relevant details of the economics of slavery, more specifically the economic value of a slave woman’s reproductive ability, since a judgment in Celia’s favor would have called into question a white master’s sexual control over his slaves (100). It seems McLaurin, despite his intentions, was unable to avoid entirely big names and big events, or politics and economy, but the book is better and more deeply illustrated because he did not avoid including them.

McLaurin’s greatest problem is the one he identified in the introduction: the availability of sources. While his sources include a variety of newspapers, census data records, and even Celia’s court case file, what he does not have is the personal documentation that would direct his formulation of some of the more personal thoughts and motivations. Since the intent is to provide an engaging narrative, McLaurin sets for himself the difficult task of providing the emotional depth that his sources cannot provide to him. McLaurin must address questions like: what was Celia thinking, how did she truly feel about her status as concubine, and what really happened the night of the murder? All McLaurin can do to answer these questions is make inferences based on the facts of Celia’s testimony and the cultural setting. In some cases, McLaurin is very successful in providing logical rationales out of minds he has no access to. For example, when the questioning began after the death of Celia’s master, the first person approached was Celia’s secret lover, George. McLaurin supposes that this was so because the inquisiting party already had some knowledge about the secret affair and suspected that George may have been involved. McLaurin also makes some unnecessary and weak conjecture. This comes about usually when he is trying to develop some of the deeper emotions involved in the crimes of rape and murder. For instance, McLaurin makes the statement that Celia’s adamant denial of any knowledge about her master’s disappearance points to a lack of remorse (36-38). There are also details missing that would flesh out the trial more. Powell, the man who interrogated Celia, willingly testified that he had to threaten Celia to get her to confess to her crime (84). Therefore, what laws were in place to protect people who confessed under duress? By extension, why were these laws not extended to someone like Celia? Was this too a matter of human rights much like Celia’s right to her own body?

In the attempt to create an interesting and novel-like narrative, McLaurin includes many details that are ultimately unimportant to the story itself. An entire paragraph is dedicated to the many ways in which Robert Newsome may have possibly travelled from Virginia into Missouri where he settled his farm, and then later McLaurin discusses the vehicle in which Newsome perhaps travelled in to an adjourning county where he purchased Celia (2, 20). The narrative is also broken by McLaurin’s habit of providing multiple guesses and inferences for one instance or action. The story may have flowed better if not for the lengthy paragraphs dotted with multiple usages of words like “maybe” and “perhaps.” It is reasonable that McLaurin must do a great deal of guessing in order to fill in information that he does not have the sources for, but there are times in the book when it is excessive. McLaurin also approaches his featured players from the perspective that each person at some point had to confront their own private “fundamental moral anxiety” over slavery, whether it was Newsome’s daughters turning the other cheek in regards to Celia’s repeated rapes, or the jury that chose to ignore certain parts of Celia’s testimony in order to protect the reputation of a white slave master and friend, and indeed the institution itself. According to McLaurin, as each individual made their choices, each had to face within himself larger questions about the humanity possessed by slaves and the morality of slavery. McLaurin even points out specifically the moment in which some individuals reached this moment of contemplation (28). Certainly not every person involved had a moment of moral questioning, and if they did, not at the moment that McLaurin feels that they did. Nevertheless, McLaurin is correct that the “fundamental moral anxiety” was essential to the institution itself, though perhaps not to every individual, since slavery and slave supporters did have to repeatedly justify themselves to the increasingly louder voice of abolition. Stressed repeatedly in sections on the case backdrop, trial, and verdict that at hand were moral issues of Celia’s basic human rights, and that is why she is an appropriate case study in the morality of slavery. In this way, McLaurin keeps to the purpose of his book.

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Disclaimer(s):

- More can be found in my Reviews section.
- If you would like me to review your book, send an email to me at morbidromantic@gmail.com. Read my Book Review Policy for more information.

Title: The Origins of American Slavery: Freedom and Bondage in the English Colonies
Author(s): Betty Wood
Genre: Nonfiction- American
Finished: January 19, 2011
Rating: 2 Stars

Betty Wood’s concise The Origins of American Slavery: Freedom and Bondage in the English Colonies examines the early roots of American slavery by tracing how and why the English adopted slave practices, why the English chose West Africans in particular for enslavement, how the ambiguous legal standing of a slave became one of undisputable human property, and how the English justified enslavement. Though Wood does not have a direct or clear thesis, she does state that she will show the English chose to enslave West Africans for economic and racial considerations. According to Wood, historians believe that either one cause or the other influenced English enslavement of West Africans, racial or economic, but according to Wood both were central elements (7-8). In Wood’s introduction, she mentions nothing about religion, though religion in fact features heavily throughout the book, both as justification for slavery and to distinguish the various English groups who sought to rationalize the practice of slavery such as the Puritans.

Slavery is typically discussed within the context of the ideology of racism since, as Wood states, the link between race and enslavement was undeniable by the 18th century. Yet, according to Wood, there are other complex systems of belief to take into account when studying the history of slavery. First and foremost, and one that historians often fail to analyze, was the English concept of enslavement and how that reconciled with beliefs about freedom. In order to practice slavery, the English had to find ways over the dual hurdles of equality and freedom. Wood stresses the absence of slavery from English common law, and that the English had to devise an unprecedented legal standard using systems practiced by the Spanish and Portuguese as the foundation. Wood is correct in stating that the hierarchy of English society and politics was transplanted to the New World, but Wood misses something important and vital about English concepts of equality, which were not all encompassing for every Englishman. Wood writes that all English could “lay claim to the liberties, privileges, and rights of Englishmen (12-13).” However, equality in English society did not exist, though freedom for all certainly did with various levels of servitude, and all men did not possess the same liberties. In the 1430s, Henry VI established the forty shilling property requirement for voting, which would be maintained until the Reform Act of 1832 lowered property requirements. It would not be until 1928 that England would remove any and all property restrictions. Hence, even in England, the English had set legal restrictions on social rank and a sense of the worth of people who were afforded legal rights accordingly. It was not, therefore, as difficult or as much of the reach that Wood suggests for the English to create newer and more restricted categories of social hierarchy and fit them into established hierarchical practices along with ethnocentrism. There was, in fact, a system in place that would support slavery by virtue of delineating the social ranking and legal powers of different men, though the model of actual enslavement was taken from elsewhere.

Wood’s thoughts are sometimes scattered and sometimes too extensive for such a small book. In chapter 3, Wood discusses early that there was a shift between indentured labor and slave labor. It is not until pages later that Wood finally delineates the numerous reasons for this shift. For a more cohesive understanding of the movement away from relying on European indentured servants to slaves, it would make more sense for Wood to include these two portions together so as not to scatter the reader by jumping between subjects. Similarly, Wood devotes a lot of space in her brief monograph toward English feelings about mainland natives. The reason Wood includes such a topic is because she is trying to make a point about why the English used West Africans instead of the ready supply of natives at hand (29, 48 & 55). However, in a book only 117 pages, devoting 10 entire pages to English feelings toward natives is excessive when instead Wood could use her pages to further flesh out shifting ideologies, practices, and economic conditions. While it is important to understand why the English chose West Africans, feelings toward the natives can be understood in greater brevity. This is especially the case when, in some sections of the book, details are lacking where they would be useful. Wood uses the example of one escaped group of white and black laborers to show that even as of the 1680s there was a distinct difference in the treatment of whites and blacks doing the same jobs. According to Wood, the fact that the black slave was dealt a different and indeed harsher punishment indicates that all black workers were considered inferior (83). While this estimation is without a doubt correct, Wood could have fleshed out her evidence more. For instance, Wood stated that the workers had different owners. Different owners may naturally have had different styles of punishment. Wood would have proven her point better to give an example of a black and white worker of the same owner. Further, more examples would have strengthened the correlation between race and punishment.

Wood would also benefit from the inclusion of citations and tables. There is no indication whatsoever what sources Wood uses to gather the numbers she gives of the slaves and English in various colonies, which feature in her claims about the growing importance and reliance on slave labor by a small portion of settlers becoming very wealthy. In fact, the book lacks any citation at all; it is impossible to know where Wood got any of her historical data. The fact that she does not provide a guide for fact verification casts doubt on her historical information, and by association, the inferences that she makes. All that Wood provides is a guide of suggested readings, lacking a proper bibliography. A conclusion would have also helped sum up her thoughts and questions, especially since she does not state a clear thesis in her introduction. Using tables for quantitative data such as population is also a useful tool for readers, and explains with better understanding what often gets confused in words. None of this is to suggest, however, that Origins of American Slavery is without any merit or historical use. Wood traces the development of English involvement in slavery and the slave trade in a clear and succinct way, and she also poses questions that readers do not typically encounter in general histories such as English law and the development of slave codes; religious justifications for enslavement; and how the virulent racism that people typically associate with slavery was not the sole cause of slavery, but rather the result of it, and necessary to remove any lingering moral question over the practice of human enslavement. The link between how America changed from small suffering colonies of starving Englishmen to one with a powerful pre-Civil War Southern economy driven by slaves is often missing. Wood places a link in early American transformation, also hinting toward later history through her examples of the small numbers of Englishmen dominating the economic scene through the products of slave labor, which would characterize the later Southern plantation economy. People recite that Africans were enslaved in America, but without asking the question of why they were the ones enslaved and how this came about. While Wood by no means provides a complete and thoroughly documented set of answers to her questions, she engages readers in what could be the beginning of an historical discussion that could be taken further with more research.
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Disclaimer(s):

- More can be found in my Reviews section.
- If you would like me to review your book, send an email to me at morbidromantic@gmail.com. Read my Book Review Policy for more information.

Title: World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
Author(s): Max Brooks
Genre: Fiction – Horror
Finished: March, 2010
Rating: 5 Stars

This is how zombie horror should be. Or horror in general, for that matter. For some reason I have yet to wrap my head around, the entire horror genre has just gotten silly. Now, I am not against the occasional horror comedy cross over. After all, Evil Dead and Shaun of the Dead are magnificent. But between the zombies overcoming their real life issues and learning to adapt to the normal world and sparkling vampires, people have somehow forgotten that monsters are meant to be feared, not laughed at or lusted after.

I admit, I was hesitant to pick up this book because there has been so much hype surrounding it. Yet as we know, sometimes the hype is well deserved. In the case of World War Z, the attention and praise is very much deserved. I think if ever there was to be a realistic depiction of how people would handle a zombie attack, World War Z hits it. The book is organized into a bunch of ‘oral history’ interviews from people who survived the zombie war. Within it are unique tales of survival, fear, and human adaptation. The characters come across as genuine and real because they express such a variety of human emotion and reaction. Some people would disbelieve. Some people would lose their minds. Some people would fight back viciously. There is no one way to handle any sort of trauma, and that is what World War Z tries to impart. Ultimately, how do people survive, both by their own action or by circumstance. And then, the story is also one about rebuilding.

I was impressed with the sheer breadth of Mr. Brooks’ knowledge. After all, he has to deal with medical technicalities, military terminology, and some serious science stuff. Either Mr. Brooks has one impressive brain, or he did a serious amount of study and expert investigation in order to piece together his book. Any reader should appreciate an author who is willing to go above and beyond, and to learn new things, in order to learn things that will make the book more realistic. I think part of the realism is due to the fact that the voice Mr. Brooks gives to his characters is that of expert, and of individual.

I have to give this book my highest rating because I was absolutely enthralled throughout. Very rarely does a book compel me to keep reading, absolutely demand that I turn the page to see what happens next. Yet, above the story of zombies, which in themselves are creatures we need not take seriously enough to fear in real life, is, as I’ve said, a story of real human action, reaction, and adaptation. There is no saying what anyone would do when faced with a life or death situation, but this book, for all of its fantastical basis, makes you really begin to question that.

Most of all, it makes zombies scary again. It reminds you that you need to be afraid of things that go bump in the night.
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Disclaimer(s):

- More can be found in my Reviews section.
- If you would like me to review your book, send an email to me at morbidromantic@gmail.com. Read my Book Review Policy for more information.

Title: Lenore: Noogies
Author(s): Roman Dirge
Genre: Graphic Novel
Finished: March 13, 2010
Rating: 4 Stars

I like cute and disturbing. They don’t call me Morbid Romantic for nothing, right? Which is why dead and macabre little Lenore is just up my ally. I admit that I have never been much into comic books, and I have always tried to avoid the Hot Topic brand of dark and spooky. Yet there is something charming about a book that features a dead girl with skulls in her hair, cradling a dead cat. I thought to myself… hey, this just may be good.

So I felt very fortunate to get my hands on the hardbacked Noogies color edition. This was my first experience with Lenore, so big fans of the series please forgive me for my fandom ignorance. Within the book are a number of chapters that contain various short length comic stories featuring Lenore, Mr. Gosh, a poor cat named Mr. Puffy who sends himself flying from a window, and a host of creepy and unsettling creatures that you sometimes both pity and also feel utterly revolted by.

Roman Dirge is clearly a very disturbed man who may need a lot of help. And what a wonderful thing he is. I thoroughly enjoyed pulling up the covers, turning on a dim light, and reading through this volume. By it’s nature, even with the appreciation of the art, this book reads very fast. I liked to skim and take in the disturbing images, my favorite Mr. Gosh, who reminded me of the villain in Nightbreed with his bag head. I will have to say that The Return of Mr. Gosh was my favorite of the comics. I just loved his initial crawl out of the ground scene… it was cute, okay? I am a sucker for love, after all.

Love never dies, or so the moral of the story is. If a moral was ever intended.

It was a wonderful read. For anyone who likes horror, who likes the disturbing, who doesn’t mind a bit of light humored baby murder and animal slaughter. There is a little bit of ghoul in all of us. I absolutely look forward to collecting the rest of these hardbacked color editions to add to the collection. I think Lenore is simply too adorable, and I love her even more that she can make me go, “ugh” from time to time. After all, who wants a world of rainbows and cupcakes?

Well, okay… me. I would love a world of rainbows and cupcakes. Yet I can’t imagine this without there also being a few coffins and skulls.

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Disclaimer(s):
- More can be found in my Reviews section.
- If you would like me to review your book, send an email to me at morbidromantic@gmail.com. Read my Book Review Policy for more information.

Yoplait and MyBlogSpark were kind enough to offer me a “Nourish Your Inner Goddess” gift pack, as well as two coupons for their new Greek yogurt all for free. I was absolutely delighted to receive the gift pack because it gave me a chance to spoil myself.

My favorite part of the pack is the velcro wrap-around towel. Ladies, you know how it is trying to do the towel tuck under your arms, which ends up falling apart if you do it wrong or too loose, so you then have to clutch madly and awkwardly at the towel with your armpits to keep it from falling and perhaps even embarrassing you. Yes. We all know how this is.

The yogurt was a bit difficult to get my hands on. My boyfriend and I went around to two different stores and came out empty handed, though finally we went to the “rich” part of town and found it in their grocery store. Relief! My long, hard search ended in success when I had been worried about certain failure. We selected our two yogurts, one blueberry and one plain. Since lately I have been very vitamin aware, I was pleasured to learn that Yoplait Greek contains a large amount of protein, as well as vitamins A and D.

The one thing I noticed right away about the yogurt was its thickness. It’s thicker than typical yogurt, a lot more creamy. Sort of the texture of… sour cream. Stirring it up to mix in the blueberries at the bottom made it fluffy, but it still retained its thick heaviness. As opposed to the sweet taste of typical yogurt, the Greek style Yoplait had a slightly sour taste. I was a bit worried about this, as the date on my yogurt was well before the sell by time, so I did a little of online looking to discover that this sourness is normal. All in all, it had a really distinct and unique flavor and texture. It was yogurt-y, but yet very different. A good yogurt, though? Yes, yes it is.

Giveaway!
One lucky winner will be chosen to receive a Yoplait Greek’s “Nourish Your Inner Goddess” gift pack that contains two coupons to try out the yogurt for yourself. But anyone can get a coupon to save $.30 off of a Yoplait Greek yogurt. All you have to do is go here and download/print.

To enter the contest, all you have to do is answer the following question:
How do you get in touch with your own inner god or goddess?

For extra entries (post each in a new comment to be counted as separate entries):
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The contest ends Sunday, June 13th, 11:59pm.

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