I dabble in non-fiction from time to time. I reviewed this book years ago, THE FAMILY ROMANOV: MURDER, REBELLION, & THE FALL OF IMPERIAL RUSSIA which is still my go to book to throw at people when they ask for a good non-fiction book. It's also one of my favorite books to give as a gift to the curious person.
Anyways, this book tells some of the life of Frederick Douglass. Frederick Douglass was a very prominent black man who did tours to deliver speeches denouncing slavery, and a bunch of other stuff.
Here's the amazon summary, "Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) is best known for the telling of his own emancipation. But there is much more to Douglass’s story than his time spent enslaved and his famous autobiography. Facing Frederick captures the whole complicated, and at times perplexing, person that he was. Statesman, suffragist, writer, and newspaperman, this book focuses on Douglass the man rather than the historical icon." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE
I may have heard the name Frederick Douglass at some point in my life before, but honestly I could not recollect anything about him. It was pretty fun to dive into the history of a man that I knew relatively nothing about.
I don't want to spend time painting the life of Frederick Douglass, if you want to know, you can read this book. Let's talk about what I wished I had seen a bit more of.
I liked reading about the different events going on around the world within the context of the struggles within Frederick's life. However, I wish it had gone further. There was a moment when they discussed Frederick's reaction to Lincoln, but I wish there had been more details about how Frederick reacted to other people, how he reacted to the world at large. One of the biggest takeaways I had from this book, was how often he traveled around to deliver his speeches. I felt kind of let down when I never got to read about any reactions to the contents of his speeches. I feel like there was too much, "He did this thing, he struggled with this business partner, next thing" without giving enough context of the world. Did he face opposition even trying to give his speeches? Was he turned away at first, but then experienced success later? I do know he was in demand at different times in his life, but I think as a whole, the only really reactions to Frederick I saw was just his colleagues. He wasn't trying to convince his colleagues though, well for the most part, he was trying to convince civilians.
I also liked reading about this period of time in American history, but I also feel like the book could have done a better job at giving the context of the framework that Frederick was working within. I find it hard to believer that the only prominent people involved within the movement were mentioned in this book. I know that if they gave everyone their time of day, this book would not be about Frederick anymore, and I get that. Just the context of what made his voice stand out so much more than everyone else's because this is what he said in comparison essentially.
I think the oddest fact that really stuck with me about Frederick Douglass is that he's one of the most photographed Americans for the era. Slight spoiler, there's not a lot of photos with him and his iconic 'lion's mane' hair within the book. It was also interesting to find out that Frederick published three autobiographies (published at different times, creating a kind of "the story so far" sense is my understanding). I kind of feel like this was a timeline of events in Frederick Douglass life rather than the story of his person.
On one hand, I kind of wonder if I expected this to be too much like a story. On the other hand, I did get to learn a lot about a famous person in history that I knew relatively nothing about before this experience. Perhaps I'm meant to seek out another book about him for further reading? I don't know, maybe I will.
Happy reading!
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