Uncle Tom's Cabin (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) FROM OUR EDITORS
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FROM THE PUBLISHER
Nearly every young author dreams of writing a book that will literally
change the world. A few have succeeded, and Harriet Beecher Stowe
is such a marvel. Although the American anti-slavery movement had existed
at least as long as the nation itself, Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s
Cabin (1852) galvanized public opinion as nothing had before. The
book sold 10,000 copies in its first week and 300,000 in its first year.
Its vivid dramatization of slavery’s cruelties so aroused readers
that it is said Abraham Lincoln told Stowe her work had been a catalyst
for the Civil War.
Today the novel is often labeled condescending, but its
characters—Tom, Topsy, Little Eva, Eliza, and the evil Simon
Legree—still have the power to move our hearts. Though
“Uncle Tom” has become a synonym for a fawning black
yes-man, Stowe’s Tom is actually American literature’s
first black hero, a man who suffers for refusing to obey his white
oppressors. Uncle Tom’s Cabin is a living, relevant
story, passionate in its vivid depiction of the cruelest forms of
injustice and inhumanity—and the courage it takes to fight
against them.
Amanda Claybaugh is Assistant Professor of English and
Comparative Literature at Columbia University.