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Mohrbooks Literary Agency
Sebastian Ritscher
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English
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FOUR HUNDRED SOULS

Keisha N. Blain Ibram X. Kendi

A Community History of African America, 1619-2019

A "choral history" of African Americans covering 400 years of history in the voices of 80 writers, edited by the bestselling, National Book Award-winning historian Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain.
Last year marked the four hundredth anniversary of the first African presence in the Americas--and also launched the Four Hundred Souls project, spearheaded by Ibram X. Kendi, director of the Antiracism Institute of American University, and Keisha Blain, editor of The North Star. They've gathered together eighty black writers from all disciplines -- historians and artists, journalists and novelists--each of whom has contributed an entry about one five-year period to create a dynamic multivoiced single-volume history of black people in America.

Author Bio: Ibram X. Kendi is a #1 New York Times bestselling author, the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University, and the founding director of the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research. He is a contributing writer at The Atlantic and a CBS News correspondent. He is the author of five books including Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction; How to Be an Antiracist; Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, co-authored with Jason Reynolds; and Antiracist Baby, illustrated by Ashley Lukashevsky.

Keisha N. Blain is an award-winning historian, professor, and writer. She is currently an associate professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh, the president of the African American Intellectual History Society, and an editor for The Washington Post's "Made by History" section. Her writing has appeared in popular outlets such as The Atlantic, The Guardian, Politico, and Time. She is the author of Set the World on Fire: Black Nationalist Women and the Global Struggle of Freedom and Until I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer's Vision of America.
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Published 2021-02-02 by Random House

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There will likely be more than a million new books published worldwide in the year 2021, but perhaps none will carry the same import and power of Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019. Edited by two of the brightest minds in all of literature and historical studies today, Dr. Ibram X. Kendi and Dr. Keisha N. Blain, the massive tome takes a community approach to telling the stories of Black history for the past four hundred years. Not only is the book deserving of all the praise it will inevitably receive, but it is also absolutely essential reading for anyone who wants to know more about the incredible struggles and immense achievements of African America over the past four centuries.

UK: Bodley Head/PRH UK

Kick Off Black History Month With Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain and a Host of Other Events ...the month kicks off February 2 with a book discussion with authors and scholars Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain on their newly released book Four Hundred Souls...In this discussion... Kendi and Blain will focus on slavery, reconstruction and segregation and their continuing impact on the United States. They will be joined by several contributors to the book... Read more...

An engrossing anthology of essays, biographical sketches, and poems by Black writers tracing the history of the African American experience from the arrival of the first slaves in 1619 to the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement... With a diverse range of up-and-coming scholars, activists, and writers exploring topics both familiar and obscure, this energetic collection stands apart from standard anthologies of African American history.

One World Special Event coverage, events for Black History Month Read more...

The authors, each in their individual voice, raise a Black chorus, demystify racial assumptions, connect the dots of law and jurisprudence, lay the unspoken cultural truths bare, look at the engineering of the foundational aspects of institutional racism and show an America ashamed of its history...

...highly readable and far more compelling than a mere historical digest would have been... This collection teaches us that nothing about the latest crisis is new... this project is a vital addition to that curriculum on race in America and should serve as a gateway to the solo works of all the voices in Kendi and Blain's impressive choir

CBS / This Morning - interview with Drs. Kendi & Blain Read more...

Every voice in this "cabinet of curiosities' is stellar... An impeccable, epic, essential vision of American history as a whole and a testament to the resilience of Black people.

FOUR HUNDRED SOULS has debuted on the New York Times Hardcover Nonfiction bestseller list at #1!

FOUR HUNDRED SOULS is reccomended by USA Today - 5 books not to miss Entertainment Weekly - The best new books to read in February Good Morning America/ ABC - The GMA Inspiration List Bustle - Most anticipated for February Book Page - Most anticipated books of 2021 Book Riot - 21 Anticipated Books to Start 2021 LitHub - Most Anticipated Books of 2021 Chicago Tribune - 25 books we can't wait to read in 2021 Seattle Times - 20 of the most eagerly awaited books of 2021 Time - The 21 Most Anticipated Books of 2021

Two leading scholars of Black culture gather writers from across genres in this provocative, stirring anthology on the traumas and triumphs of African-Americans across four centuries. From journalist Hannah P. Jones on Jamestown's first slaves to historian Annette Gordon-Reed's portrait of Sally Hemings to the seductive cadences of poets Jericho Brown and Patricia Smith, Four Hundred Souls weaves a tapestry of unspeakable suffering and unexpected transcendence.

Four Hundred Souls consists of 80 chronological chapters that bring to life the numerous and previously overlooked facets of slavery, segregation, resistance and survival. In these pages, dozens of extraordinary lives and personalities resurface from archives and are restored to their rightful place in the narrative of American history.