The Confessions of Nat Turner explained
| The Confessions of Nat Turner |
| Author: | William Styron |
| Country: | United States |
| Language: | English |
| Publisher: | Random House |
| Release Date: | 1967 |
| Media Type: | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages: | 480 |
| Isbn: | 0-679-60101-5 |
| Isbn Note: | (1st ed) |
| Dewey: | 813/.54 20 |
| Congress: | PS3569.T9 C6 1994 |
| Oclc: | 30069097 |
The Confessions of Nat Turner is a 1968 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by American writer William Styron. Presented as a first-person narrative by historical figure Nat Turner, the novel concerns Nat Turner's Rebellion in Virginia in 1831. It is a fictional retelling based on The Confessions of Nat Turner: The Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, Virginia, a first-hand account of Turner's confessions published by a local lawyer, Thomas R. Gray, in 1831.[1]
Time Magazine included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.[2]
Historical background
The novel is based on an extant document, Turner's "confession" to his white lawyer, Thomas R. Gray. In the historical confessions, Turner claims to have been divinely inspired.
Some scholars believe that mental illness may have driven Turner's actions.[3] Others believe Turner was moved by religiosity.[4]
Further reading
- Clarke, John Henrik, ed. William Styron's Nat Turner: Ten Black Writers Respond. Boston: Beacon Press, 1968.
- Genovese, Eugene D. "The Nat Turner Case", review of William Styron's Nat Turner: Ten Black Writers Respond, The New York Review of Books, 11.4 (September 12, 1968).
- Mellard, James M. "This Unquiet Dust: The Problem of History in Styron's The Confessions of Nat Turner", Mississippi Quarterly, 36.4 (Fall 1983), pp. 525–43.
- Ryan, Tim A. "From Tara to Turner: Slavery and Slave Psychologies in American Fiction and History, 1945–1968", Calls and Responses: The American Novel of Slavery since Gone with the Wind. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2008.
External links
Notes and References
- Web site: Gray. Thomas Ruffin. Thomas Ruffin Gray. 1831. The Confessions of Nat Turner. PDF.
- https://web.archive.org/web/20051021140441/http://www.time.com/time/2005/100books/ "100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005"
- Web site: Higginson. Thomas Wentworth. 2011-11-07. Nat Turner's Insurrection. 2021-12-03. The Atlantic. en.
- Drexler-Dreis. Joseph. 2014-11-01. Nat Turner's Rebellion as a Process of Conversion. Black Theology. 12. 3. 230–250. 10.1179/1476994814Z.00000000037. 142767518. 1476-9948.
