William Wells Brown

"Ezra Greenspan's painstaking historical research and artful insights of literary analysis have returned William Wells Brown to his rightful place...The very soul of this talented and complex man is laid bare by Greenspan's rich contextualization of Brown's abolitionist success, his remarkably prolific writing, and his legal statelessness in America yet cosmopolitan status as world citizen." -- Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Harvard University "An informative and often moving account." "A compelling life of one of the most remarkable men of the nineteenth century-a boon to our understanding of African American and American culture." -- Arnold Rampersad, Stanford University "A scholarly tour de force. Drawing from an astonishing range of primary materials, Greenspan renders Brown's life in a gripping, elegant narrative that opens up many new vistas on Brown and his world." -- David S. Reynolds, CUNY Graduate Center "Rich and fascinating...Ezra Greenspan has accomplished a remarkable feat of innovative research and has lucidly brought Brown, the self-taught former slave, to life as a person and as a writer who repeatedly reinvented himself in several genres while producing a brilliant critique of America's dilemma with race." -- David W. Blight, Yale University "In his day, Brown rivaled Frederick Douglass as a prominent black abolitionist and exceeded him as an author of important histories and biographies of African Americans. Ezra Greenspan's definitive biography rescues Brown from undeserved obscurity." -- James M. McPherson, Princeton University "William Wells Brown not only was the first African American novelist; he was a master at bringing his contemporaries, the heroic black men and women of the Civil War generation, into full view with his pen. Now, at last, biographer Ezra Greenspan has done the same for Brown. The result is an "experimental voyage," beautifully written and exhaustively researched, that enthralls the reader while illuminating the improvisational genius of one of the nation's most influential fugitive slaves. In reconstructing the fullness of his story, long obscured by the Jim Crow era that followed, William Wells Brown: An African American Life, ensures that Brown's rightful place in the constellation of leading black men and women of letters will remain fixed for future generations." -- Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Harvard University "A fascinating read and an excellent piece of historical detective work." -- Annette Gordon Reed, Harvard University "Greenspan's detailed study of this life of constant growth should win Brown his proper place in American history."

Ezra Greenspan is the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Professor of English at Southern Methodist University and the editor of William Wells Brown: A Reader. He lives in Dallas, Texas.