Showing results by narrator "Melissa Summers" in All Categories

James Neville-Taylor has felt the suffocating darkness that can drive a person to take their own life. After a failed suicide attempt in 2017, he realized his life would have amounted to nothing if it had ended then. So he resolved to change it.

Margaretta Matilda Odell's 1834 Memoir and Poems of Phillis Wheatley is the only substantive early source on Wheatley's life. Phillis Wheatley (ca. 1753-1784) is considered the first African American poet to write for a transatlantic audience, and her Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773) kindled debates about race.

Behind the Scenes, or Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House is the life story of Elizabeth Keckley, a shrewd entrepreneur who, while enslaved, raised enough money to purchase freedom for herself and her son. Working as a seamstress and dressmaker for the wives of influential politicians, Keckley helped organize an auction of dresses that belonged to Mary Todd Lincoln, the former first lady. The auction elicited strong criticism from the Washington elite.

Frances Ridley Havergal (December 14, 1836-June 3, 1879) was an English religious poet and composer of hymns. This inspirational book, published posthumously in the 1880s, expounds on her familiar consecration hymn "Take My Life and Let It Be". The text consists of a chapter on each couplet, examining in detail how believers can give their lives to, and stay close to Christ.

The great abolitionist speaker and author Harriet Ann Jacobs was born into slavery in 1813 in North Carolina. When her mother died, Harriet’s mistress, Margaret Horniblow, cared for her and taught her to read, write, and sew, but when Horniblow died, she suffered the misery of cruel masters.  

Revelations of Divine Love is a classic work of medieval Christian mysticism. Dame Julian of Norwich received these visions in 1373, at the age of 30. It appears from her writings that she was born in 1343 and died after 1416. The visions appeared to her over two nights when she was gravely ill. After her miraculous recovery, she described and reflected upon the 16 visions. Her theology is one of love and mercy, which has inspired and comforted many believers down the ages.

Sojourner Truth’s autobiographical narrative chronicles her life as a slave in Upstate New York and her transformation into an abolitionist, women’s rights activist, orator, and preacher. She was born around 1797 and emancipated by state law in 1827. The following year she moved to New York City, where she became involved with various unorthodox religious groups. By 1843 she had become an itinerant preacher and spent most of the next 13 years in Northampton, Massachusetts. She was illiterate; her autobiography was dictated to her neighbor Olive Gilbert.

The first part of this book (1842) by Charles Colcock Jones is an historical sketch of slavery, with an emphasis on missionary and religious efforts directed towards the slaves. Part Two deals with the moral and religious conditions of slaves. The third part describes the obligations of the Christian church to rectify existing problems, while the final part proposes strategies for implementing programs of religious instruction for slaves.

Published in 1855, this history book by William Cooper Nell has an introduction by Harriet Beecher Stowe. It focuses on African American soldiers during the American Revolution and the War of 1812. It is considered by some to be the first history book by and about African Americans which is based on written documentation.

This collection of letters written by A. B. Williams for the Charleston News and Courier recounts the voyage of the Azor, a ship sent by the Liberian Exodus Association to carry black American immigrants to Africa. Williams describes his meeting with President Anthony W. Gardner, as well as the climate and vegetation of Liberia, its government, its people, and the reception of the immigrants.

Burton's Memories of Childhood's Slavery Days (1909) consist of four parts. In the first, ‘Recollections of a Happy Life, Burton recalls her childhood on a plantation in Alabama and her marriage to Samuel Burton. In the second, 'Reminiscences,’ she reflects on emancipation while the third, ‘Vision’ is an account of her conversion. The fourth consists of an essay on Abraham Lincoln, an essay on the ‘race question,’ various poems, and hymns. 

This is the eloquent account of Jarena Lee’s (b. 1783) religious experiences. After hearing a sermon by Richard Allen, founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, she experienced a spiritual awakening. She began preaching in 1820 and became a travelling minister who traveled thousands of miles on foot throughout the North American continent.