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A Madman’s Will: John Randolph, Four Hundred Slaves, and the Mirage of Freedom
Maybe someday
42
/100
I Index Overall Rating
Readers
17/100Critics
67/100Scholars
Author:
Gregory May
Publisher:
Liveright
Date:
April 11, 2023
The untold saga of John Randolph's 383 slaves, freed in his much-contested will of 1821.
What The Reviewers Say
Eye-opening and vigorously researched.
May brilliantly captures these extraordinary events with his compelling, meticulously documented and beautifully written A Madman’s Will.
May lucidly untangles the legal proceedings and draws vivid character sketches of Randolph and others, while building an irrefutable case that freedom is only the first step to equality. This is history at its finest..
Although the narrative threatens to come to a grinding halt at times in legal minutiae, May does a good job of pointing out the contradictions of the law in both free and slave states. He also paints a vivid portrait of Randolph himself.
