βMaster of languageβ (The New York Times) John Edgar Wideman uses his unique generational position to explore what he calls the βslaveroad,β offering βa fresh perspective of slaveryβs impact and a confirmation of Widemanβs exalted status in American lettersβ (New York magazine).
John Edgar Widemanβs Slaveroad is a groundbreaking work of βbruising candor and obsessive originalityβ (The Wall Street Journal). For centuries, the buying and selling of human beings was legal, and millions of Africans were kidnapped then forcibly transported across the Atlantic Ocean to serve as slaves. The enduring legacies of this slave road trafficβdenied, unacknowledged, misunderstood, repressedβcontinue to poison the experiences and journeys of all Americans.
In a section of βSlaveroad,β called βSheppard,β William Henry Sheppard, a descendant of enslaved Virginians, travels back to Africa where he works as a missionary, converting Africans to Christianity alongside his Southern white colleague. Wideman imagines drinking afternoon tea with Lucy Gant Sheppard, Williamβs wife, who was on her own slaveroad, as she experienced her husbandβs adultery with the African women he was trying to convert. In βPenn Station,β Widemanβs brother, after being confined forty-four years in prison, travels from Pittsburgh to New York. As Wideman awaits his brother, he asks, βHow will I distinguish my brother from the dead. Dead passengers on the slaveroad.β
βA blend of memoir, fiction, historyβ (The Millions), Slaveroad is a book that will inform, challenge, and surprise Wideman fans as well as newcomers to his writing.