Textual Introduction-Textual Notes-Emendations-Hyphenations-Collation
Gerald Fulkerson
The Yale edition of Frederick Douglass's My Bondage and My Freedom seeks to present a carefully determined critical text that restores as fully as possible the form and content intended by its author. After searching for editions and printings of Bondage and Freedom and analyzing the discovered texts, we have chosen a copy-text that seems to preserve, to a greater extent than its alternatives, the accidentals (punctuation, word-division, spelling, capitalization, and means of emphasis) of Douglass's work. Collation of the copy-text against the other relevant texts coupled with examination of external evidence has resulted in emendation of the copy-text in both substantives (the language) and accidentals. The data and rationale that informed the emending process are accessible in a four-part textual apparatus (Textual Notes, List of Emendations, Historical Collation, and Line-End Hyphenation) that has been placed in an appendix in order to keep the main text uncluttered. We have left the text unmodernized in order to maintain the integrity of Douglass's vision of his work.
The publication history of Bondage and Freedom during Douglass's lifetime is relatively uncomplicated. The only edition relevant to our efforts to establish a critical text was first published in 1855 by the firm of Miller, Orton & Mulligan, with offices in New York City and Auburn, New York. This edition comprises three printings dated respectively 1855 (A), 1856 (B), and 1857 (C). In addition to the English-language edition, two foreign-language editions were published: a German translation by Douglass's friend Ottilie Assing appeared in Hamburg in 1860, and a French translation by Catherine Valérie Boissier Gasparin was published in Paris in 1883.1Douglass, Sclaverei und Freiheit: Autobiographie von Frederick Douglass; idem, Mes anneés d'esclavage et de liberté par Frédérick Douglass, marshal de Colombie (d'après l'anglais), trans. Catherine Valérie Boissier Gasparin.
Douglass's correspondence contains evidence that after the Civil War he came close to making the publication history of Bondage and Freedom somewhat more complex. In mid-1864 Rufus Saxton, the owner of the stereotype plates from which Miller, Orton & Mulligan had printed Bondage and Freedom, asked Douglass whether he wished to purchase the plates for $150, noting that "they will bring half this sum for old metal, so they are very cheap."2Rufus Saxton to Douglass, 6 June 1864, General Correspondence File, reel 2, frame 34, FD Papers, DLC. By this time Bondage and Freedom had been out of print for seven years and had become difficult to find, so it is possible that Douglass bought the plates with the intention of reprinting his
work if and when the opportunity presented itself. In August 1867, for example, he informed a correspondent who wished to purchase a copy of Bondage and Free dom that he could not give "any information where it can be procured, having myself only two or three copies left."3Douglass to Gilbert A. Tracy, 12 August 1867, Gilbert Tracy Papers, NjHi. Eight months later he was in contact with the Indianapolis publishing and job-printing firm of Downey and Brouse about republishing his autobiography, possibly from the used plates. On 31 March 1868, Downey and Brouse sent Douglass a contract based on an oral agreement reached during their meeting in Indianapolis a week earlier. In the accompanying letter they requested sketches of episodes in his life that they could turn into engravings as well as a "fine engraving" of himself for the frontispiece. They also expressed the opinion that "liberal and judicious advertising" would lead to "an immense sale" in the West and South.4Downey and Brouse to Douglass, 31 March 1868, General Correspondence File, reel 2, frames 357–58, FD Papers, DLC. Unfortunately, no correspondence survives that suggests why their apparent enthusiasm for a postwar revival of Bondage and Freedom went unrequited.
Bound exclusively in hardback and priced at $1.25, Bondage and Freedom became something of a sales phenomenon as soon as it was published in mid-August 1855. Within two days after appearing in bookstores, A's first impression of five thousand copies sold out.5Auburn Daily Advertiser, n.d., quoted in FDP, 24 August 1855. Within a month the second impression of five thousand had been exhausted, and the third impression was selling faster than the books could be bound. In mid-September Miller, Orton & Mulligan noted in American Publisher's Circular that the twelfth thousand was ready, and orders could again be filled. "Two large editions have already been sold," said the announcement, "and the third is largely drawn upon."6American Publisher's Circular and Literary Gazette, 15 September 1855. By the time B appeared several months later, A had sold sixteen thousand copies. B comprised a run of only one thousand copies, as did C.7See the title pages of B and C. Douglass participated in the distribution of his autobiography by advertising it in Frederick Douglass' Paper,8See FDP from 17 August 1855 through several months thereafter. offering it for sale in his office,9FDP, 17 August 1855. selling it during meetings on his antislavery tours,10Douglass to Gerrit Smith, 23 May 1856, Gerrit Smith Papers, NSyU. and offering it as an incentive for abolitionists to recruit subscribers to his journal.11FDP, 22 February 1856; 3 December 1858.
Only a few intentional changes in Bondage and Freedom occur from one printing to the next. The title pages of B and C, in addition to updating the year of publication, announce above the title the cumulative number of copies printed: B's header indicates that it comprised the "Seventeenth Thousand" and C's that it comprised
the "Eighteenth Thousand." C's title page also includes an altered name for the publisher: "Miller, Orton & Mulligan" became "'Miller, Orton & Co."12The title pages of the three printings are nearly identical but contain a few conventional variations. The content of the 1855 title page is arrayed as follows: MY BONDAGE / AND / MY FREEDOM / Part I.—Life as a Slave. Part II.—Life as a Freeman. / BY FREDERICK DOUGLASS / WITH/ AN INTRODUCTION/ BY DR. JAMES M'CUNE SMITH./ By a principle essential to christianity, a PERSON is eternally differenced from a / THING; so that the idea of a HUMAN BEING, necessarily excludes the idea of PROPERTY / IN THAT BEING. COLERIDGE. / NEW YORK AND AUBURN: / MILLER, ORTON & MULLIGAN. / New York: 25 Park Row.—Auburn: 107 Genesee-st. /1855. The 1856 title page differs from its predecessor in two respects: (1) "SEVENTEENTH THOUSAND" is added at the very top of the page with a plain bar between it and the first line of the title; and (2) 1856 is substituted for 1855 as the year of publication. The 1857 title page alters its immediate predecessor in three ways: (1) "EIGHTEENTH THOUSAND" is substituted for "SEVENTEENTH THOUSAND" and is printed above a wavy rather than a plain bar; (2) the name of the publisher is changed from MILLER, ORTON & MULLIGAN, to MILLER, ORTON & CO.; and (3) 1857 replaces 1856 as the year of publication. The only deliberate change in the remainder of the front matter was the intraprinting deletion in A of the date (23 May 1855) of James McCune Smith's introduction. An early copy of A (A1) includes (at the end of the introduction) the date alongside "New York" with Smith's name printed at the end of the same line. The date is missing in later copies of A as well as in B and C.
In the main text only one minor substantive alteration and three alterations in accidentals were made, each of which merely corrects a mistake or oversight by a compositor. In addition to the minor textual changes, two pages containing engravings described by the publisher as "authentic illustrations exhibiting Freedom and Slavery in contrast"13Norton's Literary Gazette and Publishers' Circular, 1 August 1855. were deleted in B and C. The title page (but neither the table of contents nor the numbering of chapters) indicates that Bondage and Freedom is divided into two parts, corresponding to the two concepts in the book's title ("Part I.—Life as a Slave, Part II.—Life as a Freeman."). The first part, chapters one through twenty-one, carries the running head "Life as a Slave" on each verso page; to symbolize the theme, A has five engravings depicting scenes from slavery facing the title page of chapter one. Chapters twenty-two through twenty-five complete the scheme with "Life as a Freeman" as a running head on the verso pages and five engravings depicting the blessings of freedom on the page facing the title page of chapter twenty-two.
The end matter includes two sections: (1) a fifty-seven page appendix containing extracts from seven of Douglass's antislavery lectures and the letter that he had written from England in 1848 to Thomas Auld, his former master, on the tenth anniversary of his escape from Baltimore; and (2) a set of advertisements of books published by Miller, Orton & Mulligan. In addition to making three minor spelling changes in the appendix, the publisher altered the number and content of the advertisements
vertisements from printing to printing: A contains four one-page advertisements; B contains five one-page advertisements (one of which cites positive critical responses for Bondage and Freedom) along with three full-page engravings; C contains four pages of book advertisements and no engravings.
The loss of much of Douglass 's incoming correspondence as well as copies of his own letters from this period in the burning of his home in Rochester, New York, in 1872 deprives us of insight into the nature of his involvement in the original publication of Bondage and Freedom and into the making of the alterations discussed above. In addition to lacking information about his relationship with his publisher, we know nothing from Douglass's own pen about his writing process. In extant correspondence, his only contemporaneous reference to the writing of the second autobiography occurs in a letter written on 18 July 1855, only about a month before Bondage and Freedom was published. He informed his mentor and financial supporter Gerrit Smith that he was "busy at work on my book. It is more of a job than at first I supposed it would be and I am beginning to be weary of it."14Douglass to Gerrit Smith, 18 July 1855, Gerrit Smith Papers, NSyU. An additional reference to Douglass's writing appears in an advertisement for Miller, Orton & Mulligan, printed in Frederick Douglass' Paper a few days after Bondage and Freedom was published: the third in a list of ten reasons why the book was selling rapidly was that "Every line and letter are his own."15FDP, 24 August 1855.
The presence of an anonymous "Editor's Preface" in the front matter of Bond age and Freedom offers no hint regarding the nature of the collaboration between Douglass and the editor. Using one and a half pages to eulogize Douglass and to vouch for the authenticity of his description of slavery and two pages to reprint (in a smaller font) a letter from Douglass solicited by the editor, the "Editor's Preface" appears to be a contrivance designed to allow Douglass to write his own introduction indirectly. The author of the "Editor's Preface," clearly from internal evidence a friend whom Douglass had known for several years, almost certainly was Julia Griffiths. An English admirer of Douglass, Griffiths had come to Rochester in 1849 to assist him in the publication of his struggling weekly journal, then named the North Star, and had taken up residence in his home for a time. In addition to helping to edit the journal and watching over its financial health, Griffiths had worked closely with Douglass on a variety of other publishing projects during her tenure in Rochester. It would therefore have been remarkable for Douglass to have sought help with his manuscript from anyone else. Given her sway with Douglass, moreover, Julia Griffiths may have exerted considerable influence on the form and substance of Bondage and Freedom. The widespread criticism that Douglass's relationship with Griffiths had stimulated in Rochester and within the abolition movement would account for her anonymity as the preface's author.16See William S. McFeely, Frederick Douglass (New York, 1991), 161–72.
Lacking manuscripts or other prepublication forms of Bondage and Freedom presumably lost in the fire that consumed Douglass's house in Rochester, we began the process of choosing a copy-text by machine collating a copy of A against copies of B and C.17All machine collating was performed by Professor Noel Polk of the University of Southern
Mississippi. We also closely read the same copies of the three printings in search of problems that would not be detected by collation, that is, problems originating in the first printing and remaining uncorrected in the second and third. About half of the problems we found with accidentals were discovered in the collation process and the other half through close reading. Observing that the problems with accidentals seemed to be caused more by type damage and slippage than by compositorial malfeasance, we machine collated four additional copies of A in search of one or more copies printed before extensive type damage and displacement had occurred.
One of the newly collated copies (A1) was found to be free of about twenty otherwise ubiquitous problems with accidentals such as missing and broken letters and punctuation marks. A1 also contains four problems caused by a compositor' s oversight and corrected in subsequent impressions of A, represented by the other four collated copies of A, A2-5. As indicated by the page and line number of the Yale edition followed by the page and line number in the copy-text, later impressions alter "Tuckanoe" to "Tuckahoe" (22.29/36.1), change "were" to "where" (153.27/269.8), add "at" to restore the phrase "not at ease" (221.26/384.10), and supply the "f" in "fair" (223.31/388.1). Despite its more accurate rendering of accidentals, A1 contains about thirty problems, mostly in accidentals, that also exist in A2–5 as well as in B and C.
A1 seems to be an early exemplar of A that preceded the making of either stop-press corrections during the printing of the first impression of five thousand copies or corrections made before the printing of the second impression. As the text closest (among those examined) to the lost final manuscript of Bondage and Freedom, A1 is our most reliable record of the accidentals intended by Douglass and has therefore been chosen as the copy-text of the Yale edition. A1 can be identified only in terms of variants that distinguish it from A2–5. We thus define the copy-text as the text in a copy of the 1855 printing with 'Tuckanoe" at 22.29/36.1, "thick" at 42.35/72.3, "were" at 153.27/269.8, "not at ease" at 221.26/384.10. "Cunningham" at 222.3/385.1, and "air" at 223.31/388.1.
Textual Notes
These notes explain our resolution of problems in the copy-text and our treatment of variants in the authoritative texts. Because the copy-text underwent no revisions intended to alter either the style or the content of the main text, these notes focus entirely on our attempts to correct compositorial errors both in accidentals and in substantives. Each note begins with the page and line number of the Yale edition and the page and line number in the copy-text followed by the adopted reading. all enclosed in a square bracket. The note follows the square bracket. [NB: For the digital edition, the textual notes are added to the text as indicated. Editors 12-2023]
Most emendations are not explicated in these notes because they are clearly demanded by the context in which the problems they address occur. The List of Emendations identifies each of the emendations explained in a textual note with an asterisk.
The symbols used to stand for the collated impressions and printings are the same ones employed in the Textual Introduction: (1) the copy-text, a copy of the first impression of the 1855 printing, is designated as A1; (2) four copies of the 1855 printing that were members of one or more later impressions are collectively designated as A2–5; (3) the 1856 printing is designated as B; and (4) the 1857 printing is designated as C.
Each textual note dealing with a variant that appears in one or more authoritative texts identifies the edition or impression in which the variant first appears. If the note identifies one text in which the variant appears without specifying that it appears only in that text, it is correct to infer that the variant appears in all subsequent editions and impressions. If a variant does not reside in all subsequent editions and impressions, the note identifies those in which it occurs.
[NOTE TO THE DIGITAL EDITION: THE TEXTUAL NOTES ARE INCLUDED IN THE PAGES WHERE THEY OCCUR IN THE DIGITAL EDITION AND THEREFORE THEY ARE NOT INCLUED IN FULL IN THE DIGITAL EDITION.
List of Emendations
This list identifies each of the variant readings incorporated into the copy-text. Each entry starts with the page and line numbers of both the Yale edition and the copy-text. An asterisk preceding the page and line numbers indicates that a note relating to that entry has been included in the Textual Notes. The adopted reading comes after the page and line numbers and is set off by a square bracket. An edition/impression symbol identifying the text in which the adopted variant first appears follows the square bracket. Most of the entries in this list lack an edition/impression symbol because the adopted reading does not reside in any of the authoritative texts. The edition/impression symbol, if any, is followed by the replaced copy-text reading. For a key to the edition/impression symbols, see the introduction to the Textual Notes.
[NOTE TO THE DIGITAL EDITION: THE TEXTUAL EMENDATIONS REFER TO PAGE LOCATIONS IN THE PRINT VOLUME. BECAUSE THEY ARE INCLUDED IN THE DIGITAL EDITION WITHIN THE TEXT, THEY ARE NOT INCLUDED IN FULL HERE]
[NOTE TO THE DIGITAL EDITION: THE FOLLOWING LIND-END HYPHENATIONS ARE NOT INCLUDED IN THE TEXT IN THE DIGITAL EDITION. USERS WILL NEED TO REFER TO THE PRINT EDITION TO LOCATE THE RELEVANT PAGE NUMBER AND LINE NUMBER TO FIND THE WORD]
Line-End Hyphenation in the Copy-Text
This list reports all the possible compound words hyphenated at end-of-line in the Bondage and Freedom copy-text. The form in which a given possible compound is presented (hyphenated or unhyphenated) constitutes the textual editor's recommendation regarding the form to be used when, in a quoted passage, the compound falls within a line. The editor's decisions are based on Douglass's usage in Bondage and Freedom and in other of his writings. Each entry consists of the page and line numbers of the Yale edition and the copy-text followed by the recommended form of the word.
21.35/34.21 without
22.7/34.32 sometimes
22.32/36.5 Grandmother
24.5/38.15 by-and-by
24.11/38.24 grandmamma
24.14/38.28 grandparents
24.32/39.10 grandmother
24.32.39.22 Grandmammy
25.33/41.13 without
26.11/42.4 corn-meal
27.34/45.9 pin-hook
28.2/45.18 somebody
28.5/45.23 demi-god
28.13/46.2 grandmother
29.9/47.21 grandmamma
29.30/48.20 grandmother
30.6/49.9 grandmammy
30.15/49.22 grandmother
31.35/53.4 grandmother
33.5/55.8 afternoon
34.11/57.8 downeast
34.12/57.9 heart-felt
34.17/57.17 bond-woman
34.19/57.20 death-bed
37.16/62.19 overseers'
37.28/62.28 OVERSEERS
37.38/63.18 himself
38.35/65.3 iron-like
41.16/69.14 cart-mending
48.6/81.15 understood
48.23/82.8 overseer
48.29/82.17 outrage
48.35/82.25 bared-headed
49.21/83.29 Nevertheless
50.18/85.17 slaveholding
50.21/85.22 slave-girl
51.27/87.21 fire-place
51.34/87.31 pain-giving
53.5/90.15 Nevertheless
53.36/91.27 overseers
55.3/93.27 overseer
55.5/93.30 whatever
57.28/98.13 something
58.6/99.3 without
58.32/100.3 overtaken
59.17/101.5 tow-linen
59.23/101.14 slave-women
62.10/105.32 elsewhere
64.3/109.28 overflowing
64.13/110.10 thiry-five
66.5/113.15 fore-top
69.21/119.15 overseer
69.28/119.25 overseers
70.21/121.5 himself
70.29/121.17 twenty-five
73.11/125.29 slave-girl
73.13/125.32 fire-place
73.39/127.5 himself
76.22/132.12 sack-cloth
77.25/134.10 son-in-law
78.24/136.1 sometimes
80.12/138.32 to-day
80.13/139.2 however
81.32/142.11 slaveholder
82.8/142.31 slaveholding
84.2/146.6 forever
84.10/146.17 anti-slavery
84.21/147.1 pathway
86.21/150.17 slaveholder
87.37/153.8 overthrown
88.17/154.3 herself
90.19/157.20 anything
92.8/160.20 birthright
92.16/160.32 something
93.29/164.3 whenever
97.7/170.1 Irishman
97.32/171.5 starboard
98.6/171.23 playmates
100.4/175.3 foretaste
100.22/175.28 hay-mow
100.36/176.15 outcry
101.34/178.1 without
103.11/180.11 childhood
103.26/180.28 grandmother
105.24/183.23 counterpart
108.17/189.1 nevertheless
109.17/190.24 self-preservation
109.28/191.8 Slaveholders
110.15/192.13 birthright
111.16/194.5 Outside
112.22/196.8 somewhere
113.38/198.22 whenever
116.7/202.17 everything
118.30/207.21 therefore
119.28/209.11 himself
122.35/214.31 cowskins
123.33/216.21 slaveholder
124.33/218.12 herself
125.32/219.29 sometimes
130.36/228.11 bare-headed
132.15/230.30 nonsense
134.13/235.2 everywhere
135.7/236.18 Pot-pie Neck
135.21/237.6 midnight
135.39/237.32 hardships
136.22/239.1 something
139.36/244.31 something
140.19/245.30 myself
141.4/246.32 without
143.4/251.5 outgrow
146.27/257.6 well-trained
147.10/258.5 slaveholders
151.15/265.10 themselves
152.5/266.17 something
157.3/275.18 slaveholding
157.18/276.7 manhood
158.25/278.8 ourselves
160.20/281.9 grave-yard
164.21/288.3 runaway
166.7/290.30 without
168.6/294.13 childhood
168.20/295.2 bare-headed
168.38/295.26 post-and-rail
170.19/298.15 themselves
170.23/298.20 slave-traders
170.24/298.21 slave-traders
171.23/300.11 freedom-loving
172.28/302.10 understand
173.14/303.14 camp-meeting
175.2/306.21 negro-traders
175.9/306.30 hardships
175.12/307.2 household
177.16/310.17 non-slaveholding
177.18/310.20 slaveholders
178.39/313.9 myself
178.39/313.10 daylight
183.3/320.14 non-slaveholder
184.1/321.28 bondman
184.34/323.14 slaveholding
185.6/323.29 Railroad
185.7/323.30 slaveholders
185.9/324.2 nevertheless
185.21/324.19 slaveholder
185.23/324.21 himself
186.26/326.19 steam-boats
188.9/329.10 Nevertheless
188.11/329.12 something
188.27/330.3 camp-ground
190.2/332.15 foreman
191.2/334.8 something
191.8/334.16 without
195.12/338.32 fellow-men
195.21/339.13 cannot
195.25/339.19 cannot
196.17/341.1 mean-time
196.21/341.7 under-ground
198.39/345.15 without
199.17/346.8 Wood-houses
201.11/349.17 noble-hearted
201.18/349.27 anything
203.31/353.29 class-leader
204.15/354.29 Something
205.4/356.5 anti-slavery
205.28/357.19 however
205.30/357.22 school-house
209.3/363.20 themselves
210.19/366.15 first-cabin
212.37/370.9 fellow-countrymen
213.5/370.17 everything
219.14/380.9 ill-gotten
219.16/380.12 slaveholders
219.32/381.3 mankind
220.31/382.27 slaveholders
221.9/383.19 anti-slavery
221.26/384.9 itself
224.2/388.14 themselves
225.21/391.2 outrage
225.23/391.5 steam-ships
231.32/402.4 landlord
233.23/405.8 handsome
Line-End Hyphenation in the Yale Edition
In quoting from the Yale edition, the only line-end hyphens that should be retained arc the following.
27.34 pin-hook
29.33 slave-women
30.19 slave-boy
34.37 Anglo-Saxon
39.39 summer-house
45.3 waiting-girl
49.38 slave-woman
59.23 slave-women
62.33 blood-bought
63.4 black-necked
71.3 pirate-chief
71.28 panic-struck
73.4 slave-girl
82.33 law-giver
89.18 ship-yard
97.28 ship-yard
103.9 great-grandmother
110.35 camp-meetings
111.4 camp-meeting
111.27 half-way
124.2 semi-lying
146.26 well-bred
148.22 self-consciousness
168.20 bare-headed
170.36 whiskey-bloated
177.16 non-slaveholding
177.34 ship-yard
180.16 blood-covered
183.3 non-slaveholder
186.26 steam-boats
188.12 newly-gained
188.27 camp-ground
199.17 self-shutting
199.19 ship-repairing
214.7 meeting-house
225.37 fellow-passengers
Historical Collation
All potentially substantive alterations, whether adopted or rejected existing in authoritative printings and impressions of Bondage and Freedom are recorded in this list. Each entry consists of the page and line numbers of the Yale edition and the copy-text followed by the copy-text reading enclosed by a square bracket. The variant reading is placed on the right side of the square bracket and is followed by printing/impression symbols indicating the texts in which the variant resides. For an explanation of the printing/impression symbols, see the introduction to the Textual Notes.
22.29/36.1 Tuckanoe] Tuckahoe A2–5; B; C
42.35/72.3 thick] hick A2–5; B; C
153.27/269.8 were] where A2–5; B; C
221.26/384.10 ease] at ease A2–5; B; C
222.3/385.1 Cunningham] Conningham A2–5; B; C
223.31/388.1 air] fair A2–5: B: C