In store now! Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint Louverture, by Sudhir Hazareesing
In Black Spartacus, winner of the Wolfson History Prize 2021, Hazareesingh tells the incredible, inspiring story of the World’s first black revolutionary, Toussaint Louverture. Filled with newly unearthed information, and written in a prose style that rivals the very best of contemporary fiction, Black Spartacus is a swashbuckling, bloodspattered, inspirational true story of resistance.
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Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint Louverture, by Sudhir Hazreesing
Paperback £10.99
The Haitian Revolution began in the French Caribbean colony of Saint-Domingue with a slave revolt in August 1791, and culminated a dozen years later in the proclamation of the world's first independent black state. After the abolition of slavery in 1793, Toussaint Louverture, himself a former slave, became the leader of the colony's black population, the commander of its republican army and eventually its governor. During the course of his extraordinary life he confronted some of the dominant forces of his age - slavery, settler colonialism, imperialism and racial hierarchy. Treacherously seized by Napoleon's invading army in 1802, this charismatic figure ended his days, in Wordsworth's phrase, 'the most unhappy man of men', imprisoned in a fortress in France
Black Spartacus draws on a wealth of archival material, much of it overlooked by previous biographers, to follow every step of Louverture's singular journey, from his triumphs against French, Spanish and British troops to his skilful regional diplomacy, his Machiavellian dealings with successive French colonial administrators and his bold promulgation of an autonomous Constitution. Sudhir Hazareesingh shows that Louverture developed his unique vision and leadership not solely in response to imported Enlightenment ideals and revolutionary events in Europe and the Americas, but through a hybrid heritage of fraternal slave organisations, Caribbean mysticism and African political traditions. Above all, Hazareesingh retrieves Louverture's rousing voice and force of personality, making this the most engaging, as well as the most complete, biography to date.
Order your copy today directly from October Books or buy online through our bookshop store and we’ll get commission on your purchase.
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