The tale of the adventures of a nineteenth century Trinidadian, born to a black slave woman and a white man. First published in 1853. 392pp, JAMAICA. UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES, 9766401330

The only biography of Baquaqua, enslaved in Benin in the 1840s and taken to Brazil. Sold to a US slaver he escaped and made his way to Haiti where he converted to Christianity. B/w ill, maps, bib, index, xv, 272pp, USA. MARKUS WIENER PUBLICATIONS INC, 1558762485

Written during the 1850s, this novel is the only known work of fiction by an African American slave. It tells the story of an self-educated young house slave whose life becomes intertwined with that of the new mistress of the plantation, and the secrets which puts them both at risk. Introduced and edited by Henry Louis Gates. Index, bib, notes, apps, 338pp, UK. VIRAGO, 1860490131

New edition of an 1810 account. Born in West Africa around 1742, Jeffrey Brace was captured by slave traders at sixteen and shipped to Barbados, where he was sold. After fighting as an enslaved sailor in the Seven Years War, Brace was taken to Connecticut and sold again. Brace later enlisted in the Continental Army in hopes of winning his manumission. After military service, he was honourably discharged and freed from slavery In 1784. He moved to Vermont, the first state to make slavery illegal. There he married, bought a farm, and raised a family. Although literate, he was blind when he narrated his life story to an antislavery lawyer, Benjamin Prentiss. Brace died in 1827, a well respected abolitionist. Index, bib, xvi, 240pp, USA. UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN PRESS.

Compiles four classic slave narratives from Frederick Douglass, Olaudah Equiano, Harriet Jacobs (Linda Brent) and Mary Prince. Includes an introduction from the editor. Bib, app, 672pp, USA. PENGUIN BOOKS USA, 0451528247

An account of a British naval officer's attempts to suppress the illegal slave trade along the Zanzibar coast. Both a historical account and an adventure story. Illustrated with b/w photographs. 233pp, TANZANIA/ZANZIBAR. GALLERY PUBLICATIONS, 998766704X

A short study of Northern Irish connections with the Slave Trade, its anti slavery movement and Olaudah Equiano's visit to Belfast in 1791 2. BNS, 27pp, UK. ULSTER HISTORICAL FOUNDATION, 0953960404

definitive biography tells the story of the former slave Olaudah Equiano (1745?-97), who in his day was the English-speaking world's most renowned person of African descent. Equiano's greatest legacy is his classic 1789 autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. A key document of the early movement to ban the slave trade, it includes the earliest known firsthand description by a slave of the horrific Middle Passage from Africa to the Americas. Filled with fresh revelations about this many-sided figure - most notably that Equiano may have been born not in Africa, as he claimed, but in South Carolina, that Equiano may have fabricated his African roots and his survival of the Middle Passage not only to sell more copies of his book but also to help advance the movement against the slave trade. Index, bib, 400pp, USA. UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA PRESS.

An abridged edition of this classic memoir by an African who was sold into slavery as a boy and after many adventures won his freedom at the age of twenty one. Notes, b/w illus, 190pp, UK. HEINEMANN AFRICAN WRITERS SERIES.

The classic 1789 autobiography of an African slave and his experiences in Africa, the New World and Europe. This edition is compiled and annotated by Paul Edwards, an acknowledged authority on the work and includes a clear introduction to Olaudah Equiano's life and writing. Notes, bib, xxxviii, 186pp, UK. PEARSON EDUCATION, 0582264731

The editors of this volume concur with Aldon Nielson that the middle passage may be the great repressed signifier of American historical consciousness. The essays collected here illustrate that the repressed memory of crossing lives not only in the academy, in oral traditions, and in the stone walls of slave fortresses but in the liturgy as well as the spiritual and religious practices throughout the African Diaspora. Includes an essay on African-Americana in Dakar. 154pp, GERMANY. LIT VERLAG.

The story of a Ghanaian slave taken to the Netherlands in the eighteenth century, with resonance for the present relations between the two countries. vii, 102pp, GHANA. SUB-SAHARAN PUBLISHERS.

The story of a woman captured in 1749 in Sierra Leone and taken to the Americas on a slave ship. Through the lives of her descendents, the author creates a saga of black women in America, illuminating the meaning of roots and the links between women and their female ancestors. 250pp, USA. BROADWAY BOOKS, 076790883X

New smaller format edition. Mende Nazer grew up in the remote Nuba mountains of Sudan. When raiders swept into her village she was taken into slavery and sold to an Arab woman in Khartoum. After seven years in captivity, in 2000 she was taken to London to serve a relative of her master. Eventually she escaped to freedom after making contact with other Nuba exiles. With journalist Damien Lewis, she recounts her life in captivity and describes the modern slave trade. 325pp, UK. VIRAGO.

Fictionalised account of the life of Olaudah Equiano who was captured as a child and sold into a life of slavery. In spite of his terrible experiences. Equiano survived to become a leading campaigner against the slave trade and 'the Father of Black Literature'; Equiano and his sister were among countless thousands of children who were wrenched from their African homeland in the 17th and 18th centuries to suffer the inhuman and degrading brutality of transportation and slavery. Bib, 345pp, UK. LIBRARIO

In an adventurous and extraordinary life, Equiano (c.1745-c.1797) criss-crossed the Atlantic world, from West Africa to the Caribbean to the USA to Britain, either as a slave or fighting with the Royal Navy. His account of his life is not only one of the great documents of the abolition movement, but also a startling, moving story of danger and betrayal. Great Journeys allows readers to travel both around the planet and back through the centuries - but also back into ideas and worlds frightening, ruthless and cruel in different ways from our own. 128pp, UK. PENGUIN.

Using recently uncovered correspondence, the author reconstructs of the experiences of Little Ephraim Robin John and Ancona Robin Robin John, two eighteeth century slave traders from Nigeria who were betrayed by competitors and sold into slavery themselves. Transported to Dominica, Virginia and England where they sued for freedom, they returned to their home where they resumed their trade. Their story survives as a rare first hand account of the Atlantic slave experience from an African perspective. Index, notes, maps, 189pp, UK. HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 0674013123

During the 1930s the American government commissioned interviews to be carried out with the African American population of the Southern States to collect testimonies about slavery in the antebellum South. A recent HBO television series unearthed these extraordinary documents and the accompanying book illustrates these with contemporary photographs. A rare volume which gives voice to the former slaves of the American South. 159pp, USA., 0821228420