| William Wells Brown Subjects: Fugitive slaves; African American authors; African Americans; Antislavery movements; American literature; Autobiography; African Americans; Born into slavery in Kentucky, William Wells Brown (1814-1884) was kept functionally illiterate until after his escape at the age of nineteen. Remarkably, he became the most widely published and versatile African American writer of the nineteenth century as well as an important leader in the abolitionist and temperance movements. EZRA GREENSPAN holds the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Chair in Humanities and is professor of English at Southern Methodist University. He is the author or editor of seven books and a founding editor of the journal Book History . |