These were the pioneers of free love, common-law and transient marriages, queer identities, and single motherhood - all deemed scandalous, even pathological, at the dawn of the twentieth century, though they set the pattern for the world to come. Wrestling with the question of freedom, they invented forms of love and solidarity outside convention and law. These women refused to labour like slaves or to accept degrading conditions of work. Their defeats were bitter, but their triumphs became the blueprint for a world that was waiting to be born. The first generations born after emancipation, their struggle was to live as if they really were free. 'Exhilarating.A rich resurrection of a forgotten history' The New York TimesĪt the dawn of the twentieth century, black women in the US were carving out new ways of living. 'A startling, dazzling act of resurrection' Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow a beautiful experiment in its own right' Maggie Nelson WINNER OF A NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARDīY THE RECIPIENT OF A MACARTHUR GENIUS GRANT SHORTLISTED FOR A JAMES TAIT BLACK PRIZE 2020
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