<I>Clotelle; Or, The Colored Heroine, a Tale of the Southern States</I>
date: label: Date
content: 1867
name: label: Written by
content: William Wells Brown, American, 1815 - 1884
label: Published by
content: Lee & Shepard, American, 1862 - 1905
notes: label: Caption
content: Written by William Wells Brown and first published in England in 1853, Clotelle is widely considered the first novel by an African American author. Brown was born enslaved in Lexington, Kentucky in 1815. He escaped in 1834, first to Canada and then residing in New York where he was an active lecturer in the American abolitionist movement. A self-taught writer, his first book was the autobiographical The Narrative of William W. Brown, A Fugitive Slave in 1842. He wrote Clotelle while living in England following the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act in 1850.
label: Caption
content: Considered part of the "tragic mulatto" genre, the novel was originally published as Clotelle; or the President's Daughter. It tells the story of Clotelle, the enslaved daughter of Thomas Jefferson and a light-skinned woman enslaved by Jefferson, and Clotelle's daughter Mary. Brown published three subsequent versions of the novel in the United States - the serialized Miralda; or, The Beautiful Quadroon in 1860, a third edition titled Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States in 1864 and this final version, Clotelle; Or, The Colored Heroine, a Tale of the Southern States, in 1867. All of the American versions change the names of the characters and remove Thomas Jefferson entirely; the 1867 version is the only one to address the Civil War and its immediate aftermath. Clotelle appears in this version as the granddaughter of an enslaved woman who claimed her father was an unnamed U.S. Senator.
label: Description
content: A hardcover book titled Clotelle; Or, The Colored Heroine, a Tale of the Southern States written by William Wells Brown. The book has a green and brown marble patterned cover and a brown leather spine with gold lettering. The pages are yellowed and have black printed text. Some pages are creased or torn. The book has 114 pages, with a single plate illustration opposite the title page.
topic: label: Topic
content: African American
label: Topic
content: American South
label: Topic
content: Antislavery
label: Topic
content: Free communities of color
label: Topic
content: Literature
label: Topic
content: Race relations
label: Topic
content: Reconstruction, U.S. History, 1865-1877
label: Topic
content: Slavery
label: Topic
content: U.S. History, Civil War, 1861-1865
setName: label: See more items in
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture Collection
label: Classification
content: Books and Published Materials
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture
identifier: label: Object number
content: 2022.76.10
objectType: label: Type
content: books
objectRights: label: Restrictions & Rights
content: No known copyright restrictions
label: Restrictions & Rights
content: Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.
physicalDescription: label: Medium
content: ink on paper
label: Dimensions
content: H x W x D: 7 1/16 × 4 5/16 × 13/16 in. (18 × 11 × 2 cm)