Beloved Sisters and Loving Friends : Letters from Rebecca Primus of Royal Oak, Maryland, and Addie Brown of Hartford,Connecticut, 1854-1868

Rating:
Summary: Critical glimpse into nineteenth-century black life
Review: Farah Griffin, editor of last year's "A Stranger in the Village: Two Centuries of African-American Travel Writing" has done it again with "Beloved Sisters and Loving Friends." This wonderful collection of letters between Rebecca Primus and Addie Brown allows readers to enter the world of nineteenth-century black American life. Through the correspondence of these "ordinary" women, the reader gains invaluable perspective on the social, political,economic and religious concerns of blacks around the time of the Civil War. In addition, the correspondence between these two loving friends is a welcome addition to all the historical collections of letters, diaries, etc. that document so well the white American experience while neglecting the experiences of black Americans and others. This collection is important and timely and I applaud Professor Griffin's achievement of giving voice to these two women and the world in which they lived.

Rating:
Summary: more photos
Review: this book was very interesting in that one could explore the eIvertyday goings on of a time that we're so far removed from.I would like to have seen many more photos. You can identify much more with the characters in this way. from a historical point of view it was quite enlightening to see how black americans took a hand in their own destiny what with all the odds staked against them. we can see the format that is used even to this day. another interesting point is that there is noting new under the sun. It seems some of the everyday occurencess still prevail today under different circumstances. Though at times the letters were a little boring and written without prpoer punctuation, it helped to bring out the true personality of the writer. All in all for me it was a trip back into time.

Rating:
Summary: A patched-together narrative that needs massive editing
Review: Very disappointing book. This is not "co"-respondence--it's two separate sets of letters that don't speak to each other; thus there's no dialogue. Further, the editor did not do her job of cleaning out the underbrush, so the letters are unflaggingly boring in their ungrammatical microdomesticity. Only now and then is there a flash of insight into the broader historical/sociological picture. This book is merely an assemblage of transcriptions interspersed with short bursts of mostly redundant editorial comment. With maps, historical timelines, sidebars, and incisive editing, this book could have been much more. As it is, it reads and feels like no more than a senior high school term paper. Shame on all concerned.