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bejouled's review
1.0
Overall, this is actually a very good book - informative an interesting. I wanted to give it 4 or 5 stars.
But. Then I got to the chapter about how PT Barnum purchased a "160-year old" slave, Joice Heth, to act as his first exhibit.
This chapter could have been written in a way that acknowledged what happened without condoning it. It wasn't. At every opportunity, the author went out of his way to soften and excuse the fact that Barnum purchased a human being to use as a showpiece. He claims that while Barnum "in essence" participated in the slave industry (there's no essence about it!), this is really just a twenty-first century view, and Heth considered herself a performer, and Barnum her manager. Not that Barnum paid her or anything. He owned her.
He also said that when Barnum first heard about Heth, he knew he had to go see such a fascinating "creature." When Heth died, Barnum has a surgeon perform an autopsy to discover how old she actually was. No acknowledgement of the fact that, unless Heth expressly allowed it ahead of time, this was a gross violation and another example of Barnum treating her like an object. The author also includes a "funny" anecdote about one of Barnum's associates claiming that Heth was still alive, and they had just stolen another Black lady's corpse to do an autopsy on. But that was just a "practical joke" played on the newspaper.
If they ever come out with an edition of this book where this chapter is edited to talk about Black people like people, then I might give it more stars, because like I said, the rest of the book is fascinating. I wondered whether I should give some credit in my rating for that, but ultimately decided that if an author talked about Jews (like me) the way this author talked about Black people, I would be horrified if people rated it highly because they could ignore the anti-Semitism. And so likewise, I cannot ignore the racism here.
But. Then I got to the chapter about how PT Barnum purchased a "160-year old" slave, Joice Heth, to act as his first exhibit.
This chapter could have been written in a way that acknowledged what happened without condoning it. It wasn't. At every opportunity, the author went out of his way to soften and excuse the fact that Barnum purchased a human being to use as a showpiece. He claims that while Barnum "in essence" participated in the slave industry (there's no essence about it!), this is really just a twenty-first century view, and Heth considered herself a performer, and Barnum her manager. Not that Barnum paid her or anything. He owned her.
He also said that when Barnum first heard about Heth, he knew he had to go see such a fascinating "creature." When Heth died, Barnum has a surgeon perform an autopsy to discover how old she actually was. No acknowledgement of the fact that, unless Heth expressly allowed it ahead of time, this was a gross violation and another example of Barnum treating her like an object. The author also includes a "funny" anecdote about one of Barnum's associates claiming that Heth was still alive, and they had just stolen another Black lady's corpse to do an autopsy on. But that was just a "practical joke" played on the newspaper.
If they ever come out with an edition of this book where this chapter is edited to talk about Black people like people, then I might give it more stars, because like I said, the rest of the book is fascinating. I wondered whether I should give some credit in my rating for that, but ultimately decided that if an author talked about Jews (like me) the way this author talked about Black people, I would be horrified if people rated it highly because they could ignore the anti-Semitism. And so likewise, I cannot ignore the racism here.
mbt1963's review
adventurous
informative
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
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