Behind the Scenes, Or, Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House

Description

An autobiographical narrative, Behind the Scenes traces Elizabeth Keckley’s life from her enslavement in Virginia and North Carolina to her time as a seamstress to Mary Todd Lincoln in the White House during Abraham Lincoln’s administration. It was a controversial book at the time of its release – an uncompromising work that transgressed Victorian boundaries between public and private life, and lines of race, gender, and society.

Keckley’s first 30 years were spent as a slave.  The cruelties and injustices of her life are related clearly and succinctly. This enlightening memoir recounts:

• the harsh treatment she endured while enslaved;
• how she became a dressmaker to support her master and his family;
• how she was determined to purchase freedom for herself and her son;
• how her friends in St. Louis came to her aid;
• how she became Mary Todd Lincoln’s dressmaker and close friend; and
• her perspectives and experiences from her inside view of Lincoln’s White House.

Keckley emerges as a calm and confident person who speaks of a very tumultuous period of American history.