The Confessions of Nat Turner
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Trade in The Confessions of Nat Turner (Vintage Classics) for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Plus, get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Book Description
A first-person narrative that depicts a good man's transformation into an avenging angel
Product Description
In 1831 Nat Turner awaits death in a Virginia jail cell. He is a slave, a preacher, and the leader of the only effective slave revolt in the history of 'that peculiar institution'. William Styron's ambitious and stunningly accomplished novel is Turner's confession, made to his jailers under the duress of his God. Encompasses the betrayals, cruelties and humiliations that made up slavery - and that still sear the collective psyches of both races. (20031017)
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Written in 1968, Styron's "Confessions" delves deep into
the psychology behind Nat Turner's 1831 slave revolt. Almost
unbearable in its graphic violence and Biblically-dimensioned
heartbreak, the novel (for it *is* fictional) has Turner
telling the whole story in painfully honest detail. Styron
neither defends Turner nor paints him as crazy; he is less
interested in pointing out right or wrong than in trying to
understand the broad ironies of the system of slavery and its
effects on the people who ran it and were subject to it.
Styron's Nat Turner is a man who is both educated and destroyed
by his masters; he is both uplifted and misled by the Bible.
His hatred is not fueled by the hatred of whites, but by the
pity of whites. And when he kills, he is only able to commit
one physical murder, though he takes responsibility for 60.
The book is often painful to read, especially for one who
might think that race relations today have little to do with
19th-century slavery. But in its wealth of detail and its
ability to enter into the mind of a complex and criminal mind,
it is unique, and should be required reading for every
self-termed patriotic American.
the psychology behind Nat Turner's 1831 slave revolt. Almost
unbearable in its graphic violence and Biblically-dimensioned
heartbreak, the novel (for it *is* fictional) has Turner
telling the whole story in painfully honest detail. Styron
neither defends Turner nor paints him as crazy; he is less
interested in pointing out right or wrong than in trying to
understand the broad ironies of the system of slavery and its
effects on the people who ran it and were subject to it.
Styron's Nat Turner is a man who is both educated and destroyed
by his masters; he is both uplifted and misled by the Bible.
His hatred is not fueled by the hatred of whites, but by the
pity of whites. And when he kills, he is only able to commit
one physical murder, though he takes responsibility for 60.
The book is often painful to read, especially for one who
might think that race relations today have little to do with
19th-century slavery. But in its wealth of detail and its
ability to enter into the mind of a complex and criminal mind,
it is unique, and should be required reading for every
self-termed patriotic American.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book did something that few books do - it made me cry. I think my tears were the result of an immersion in the scene and characters of the novel (both of which are deeply and intensely drawn) and a general sense of frustration about the world that it should have such painful things in its history.
The hero of the novel, and the narrator of the story, is the leader of a slave revolt in Virginia in 1831, Nat Turner. It is based on real historical events and Styron claimed to be trying to re-create 'a man and his era' . The novel accompanies Turner through each painful, ill-fated move leading up to his capture and a sad end.
I think this book is remarkable for its thick, richly drawn character development. It's passionate, grand, awful, very serious, all these words seem to fit. It's definitely not a light read, but I have gone on to read other William Styron books, and this still seems the strongest and my favourite.
Many people will take a familiar moral message about the iniquities of slavery away from the reading of this book, but Styron also called it a 'meditation on history'. The true story of Nat Turner from his own point of view is not one we will ever hear. We do have a short pamphlet entitled 'The Confessions of Nat Turner', claiming to be his words (a piece of propaganda probably created by the court which tried him) and we have Styron's masterly novel. Two stories, and the truth probably in neither.
If you wanted to find out more about the 'real life' stories of slaves in the pre-Civil War US, I would also heartily recommend The Narrative of Frederick Douglas or Harriet Jacob's Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl. I found these quite fascinating and powerful in a different way.
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Styrons novel "the confessions of Nat Turner" uses the most famous slave revolt in US history as the starting point for a fictionalized biography of Nat Turner and by extension black american slavery itself. He conjurs up the horrors of slavery and its banalities in a fast paced narrative that is also an evocation of the subtle beauties of the Virginia countryside. Overall Styron succeds brilliantly in recreating the peculiarities of the American past whilst providing a primer on race relations for the American present.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Magnificent
In August 1831, in a remote region of south-eastern Virginia, took place the only effective and sustained revolt in the history of American Negro slavery. Read more
Published on 6 May 2004 by HORAK
A unique book which takes you into the soul of a slave.
This work, steeped in accurate historical settings and moving religious allegories, takes the reader into the very core of a southern slave.
Published on 22 Mar 1997
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
