12 Years A Slave: A True Story

I'm a 50 something lady. I heard all the History stories in school, but to read this written by a man who actually lived it was JAW DROPPING. The "slang" that was spoken, took you there in the slave quarters, the cotton fields, speaking to the land owner, as if you were right there with them. The true brutality that this author and all those he spoke about was absolutely awful. Thank goodness there was someone who listened to him, got the word out to his family, and he made it home. And all, without anger or hatred or revenge in his heart.

As slave stories go, this one is, in my view, without peer. Northup's s captivating tale -- which has gained attention because of the movie that shares the book's title -- is told in exacting detail with an easy prose. He sets the stage masterfully, describing people and places before proceeding into the narrative. Unlike works of fiction, this book is so compelling because, by all accounts, it is true. There is no polemical axe to grind, as with Uncle Tom (a novel at one point wryly referenced by Northup). Here you see both the brutality of slavery and the moments of kindness by slaves and even some slave owners. Solomon tells the story with clarity and intelligence.The free versions on other sites I found were pretty poorly formatted, so spending a dollar for a polished version on Amazon is worthwhile, but this one is not the best of them. Granted, the book is formatted adequately, and any typographical errors in this version seem to be simple reproductions of the original.However, the supporting material is a letdown. I read the version that includes the introduction by novelist Dolen Perkins-Valdez. That introduction is borderline insulting, as it makes only a weak attempt to separate accounts with fictional elements like Roots from an authentic account like this one. Worse still, Perkins-Valdez can't resist indulging in repeatedly referencing her own recently released slave novel, even going so far as to quote herself. There are almost no historical elements to this version beyond the main book -- no mention of Northup after the book, no mention of he writer who helped him pen the book, nothing. There is more information on the writer of the introduction than there is the author. One other oddity worth mentioning: the original book's preface -- the one done by the man who helped Northup write the book -- has been curiously excised from this version too. That makes this version something less than complete.For those looking for a better version, you might consider  Twelve Years a Slave - Enhanced Edition by Dr. Sue Eakin Based on a Lifetime Project. New Info, Images, Maps , which contains a robust amount of supporting material and, better still, is right now the same cost as this version.

I bought this after watching the movie. I am a college student that works full time, so I usually don't have much time for reading things that aren't school related. I finally got around to finishing this. This is an extremely difficult book to read. What this man went through was astoundingly awful. It is an important narrative though. If you want to understand southern culture as it is today, if you want to get a deeper understanding of race relations in America, or if you just want to read a good book, I highly recommend it. You get a real picture of what institutional (versus man to man) racism is. You will also understand how far our country has come from it. If one black man can triumph over adversity in that day, all of them certainly can now. A history professor once told me that it's not enough to just say that the south was wrong, you have to understand why they thought like they did. This will definitely shed some dark light on the subject.

If you want to read this book in Spanish do not waste your money, the translation is horrible, to the point of being incomprehensible. There is another version in Spanish on Amazon with very little difference in price that is perfect. I think that Amazon should remove this book from the market.$ 2.16 with the tax that goes to the trash.The other version (Kindle) costs $ 6.99 and the translation is perfect.An excellent book! / Si usted quiere leer este libro en español no pierda su dinero, la traduccion es horrible, hasta el punto de ser incomprensive. Hay otra version en español en Amazon con muy poca diferencia en precio que es perfecta. Pienso que Amazon deberia retirar este libro del mercado.Son$ 2.16 con el tax que van a la basura.La otra version ( Kindle) cuesta $ 6.99 y es perefecta la traduccion.Un excelente libro !

You read about slaves, slave owners and plantations in school history books. They barely touch on the subject and none are on a personal level. This book was written by a free man who was kidnapped and sold into slavery. His first hand accounts of his experiences are absolutely astounding. Twelve years of back breaking work, degradation and beatings are chronicled in this book.This man was lucky enough to have the know how and education to get himself out of this situation, even though it took him years to do so. My heart weeps for all of those slaves who toiled year after year, generation after generation. How man can treat another so cruelly is beyond my imagination.If you truly want to understand how the slaves lived and died, suffering daily, you must read this book. It is a real eye opener and heart breaker.

I am so happy to have read this book. I promised myself I'd not watch the movie till I'd done so. Wow! What a life of horrors this man lived having only his dream of returning to his family alive. We are so ignorant of the stolen time, life, & relationships our black brethren endured at the hands of greed, arrogance, injustice, ignorance, & above all, a superiority complex that has been revived & Fed with constant lies by the crasher of OUR White House, the father of Vulgarity, Lies, Cowardice, Crookery, Insecurity, Injustice, Hate, Lack of Empathy, Corruption, Division, Classlessness, Misogyny, Disrespect, & above ALL, its, its family's, & its administration's state of TOTAL MORAL & VALUES BANKRUPTCY. I'm so happy to have read this book.

David Wilson helped Solomon Northup write this book and this fact, that a white man helped a black man write his experiences may be one of the reasons that when it comes to books by slaves this has been often overlooked in the past (of course with a film adaptation that changed). At the time of the first publication of this it was quite well known as it came on the back of ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ and gave more weight to the abolitionist movement. Solomon did give lectures and such like when this was first published and then dropped out of the limelight, and I don’t think anyone really knows what happened to him, when he died, or where.Northup was a free man although black, as he was a resident of New York, and his father had been given his freedom in the past. Northup was tricked and then kidnapped and sold on as a slave, which did happen on occasion. It is a part of the slave trade that we seem to overlook when we talk about African American history. You needed to be able to produce documents to prove that you were a free man, and in the case of Northup and many others, they were either stolen, or were not obtained in the first place. Indeed, such tricks were quite old and similar ones were played on those Europeans who sold themselves into bondage to eventually achieve something in America in the past.Solomon gives us his account of how he found himself to be kidnapped and enslaved, and what he went through whilst dreaming of freedom. He was an educated man, practical with his hands and was married with three children and it was truly appalling what happened to him. This story is quite harrowing as most slave literature is and reminds us that such practices still are with us today, and should be stopped.Because Solomon was from the State of New York, this actually turned out to be his salvation as that State had already passed a statute if such a thing should happen to a black resident, with regards to kidnapping and sold into slavery. For twelve long years Solomon was a slave, and then thankfully due to a Canadian helping him his friends from New York were able to locate him. Mainly in part to the new film release of this that we do in part owe a thanks to this book once more being widely available as it reminds us all of man’s inhumanity to man and that as we are now in the Twenty First Century perhaps more thought and action should be given to preventing slavery and other inhumanities from continually occurring. I’m no optimist and I know that things such as wars are inevitable, but slavery and other degradations of our fellow humans should be stopped if we want to progress as a species.

On one level this is simply a story about a man who finds himself in hell and just wants to go home. On that level it's a page-turner.The other level is that it's a true story.In places it's not at all an easy book to read. Not because of the writing, which is straight forward and remarkably detached - Northrup wrote just to tell his story and let it speak for itself - but because of the things and the events it describes.If you've seen the film but not read the book be warned that the film does not come close to depicting the violence in the book. The film had to look away; Northrup couldn't.Northup's story is very powerful on the barbaric and brutal levels of violence, on the senseless hate, the screaming injustice, and the sheer stupidity of slavery and on the way a slave-owning society above all brutalises itself.That perhaps is the most horrifying aspect - that an entire society, with a few brave exceptions, thought all this was perfectly Christian and reasonable.

Born as a free coloured man, Solomon Northup was tricked, drugged, kidnapped, tortured and hence sold into slavery. His name and identity were snatched away from him and he was forced to be slave and after 12 years remaining slave under various masters, he obtained freedom in January 1853. Solomon Northup penned his memoir which is a factual and detailed record of his tricking into, struggle, fight, efforts for freedom and finally attaining freedom.This memoir is divided into 22 chapters and each chapter is description of major events of these years of slavery. There are a few but potent and powerful illustrations of events. The beauty of this book lies in the fact that the narrator admitted that not all whites were mean to him. If his abductors were white so was his rescuer. It's not the colour it's the intentions, greed and lack of compassion which makes or mar a man to be human.In Northup Solomon's words, "I have no comments to make upon the subject of Slavery. Those who read this book may form their own opinions of the 'peculiar institution'. What it may be in other States, I do not profess to know ;what it is in the region of Red River, is truly and faithfully delineated in these page. This is no fiction, no exaggeration. If I have failed in anything, it has been in presenting to the reader too prominently the bright side of the picture"I recommend this book whole heartedly as it is a gem of a book. If you skip to read it you are undoubtedly missing one of the finest piece of literature.

Amazing must read. I first watched the film and a few years later brought this book. I could not put it down or comprehend the cruelty. That people think they have the right to own or treat another human being in such away. We may argue, that it was a different time. But things have not changed! Human trafficking exists in our times still, even though another word for Slavery and not always against a black human being, as it was back in Solomon’s time. I certainly can not comprehend the cruelty of any human being to another human being. Having children ripped from your arms and sold. Being raped and constantly in fear of your life and not always for disobeying an order, but because of someones whim or satanic pleasure that can only be called monsters then and monsters today. Thankfully humanity in some people still exist. The book Twelve years a slave is wonderfully written and sadly hundreds of stories that are true and need to be written. Not hopefully for our enjoyment but giving us the understanding and knowledge not to repeat and if done and we are made aware do something about.

I was inspired to buy this after seeing the film, and I think it speaks volumes that Steve McQueen and his cast made the film so breath-taking. Granted there is artistic licence in making the movie, but hard as I tried I found the book a little repetitive. Not to say it is not interesting, but it just feels tedious - for me it failed to articulate the horrors that Northup must have endured in those dozen years in quite the way I expected. Part of this may have been a language issue given the book was written well over a century ago and this is not to say this is a bad book - far from it - just that I had perhaps hoped for more.