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Lädt ... African Queen: The Real Life of the Hottentot Venusvon Rachel Holmes
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Melde dich bei LibraryThing an um herauszufinden, ob du dieses Buch mögen würdest. Keine aktuelle Diskussion zu diesem Buch. Holmes is a South African academic, so the treatment is scholarly, restrained in tone, careful to stick only to the facts. Which is fine, because the story is so horrific that the bald facts she can dig up--there are a lot of gaps--tell us enough. I don't give it a five star for two reasons that might bother few others. Holmes seems a bit naive re Saartjie's relationship with her first two handlers. I also think we need some more historical and political context of southern Africa at the time. How many were slaves or had been been? Saartjie, though forced from her homeland, orphaned and widowed by Europeans, ends up in Cape Town as a servant--bonded, maybe?--not a slave. Who became a slave and how difficult was it extricate oneself? (I know in the Americas it was much easier for a slave of the Spanish to work his way out than under the British.) The author mentions very much in passing some of the foreign-born slaves. Now, I know the "Malays," now known as Cape town Malays, were brought by the Dutch from Indonesia. Chinese were probably brought from what is now Taiwan. But she also mentions "Indochinese." for this period; this was new to me. Anybody know? Zeige 5 von 5 keine Rezensionen | Rezension hinzufügen
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Saartjie Baartman was twenty-one years old when she was taken from her native South Africa and shipped to London. Within weeks, the striking African beauty was the talk of the social season of 1810-hailed as "the Hottentot Venus" for her exquisite physique and suggestive semi-nude dance. As her fame spread to Paris, Saartjie became a lightning rod for late Georgian and Napoleonic attitudes toward sex and race, exploitation and colonialism, prurience and science. In African Queen, Rachel Holmes recounts the luminous, heartbreaking story of one woman's journey from slavery to stardom. Born into a herding tribe known as the Eastern Cape Khoisan, Saartjie was barely out of her teens when she was orphaned and widowed by colonial war and forced aboard a ship bound for England. A pair of clever, unscrupulous showmen dressed her up in a body stocking with a suggestive fringe and put her on the London stage as a "specimen" of African beauty and sexuality. The Hottentot Venus was an overnight sensation. But celebrity brought unexpected consequences. Abolitionists initiated a lawsuit to win Saartjie's freedom, a case that electrified the English public. In Paris, a team of scientists subjected her to a humiliating public inspection as they probed the mystery of her sexual allure. Stared at, stripped, pinched, painted, worshipped, and ridiculed, Saartjie came to symbolize the erotic obsession at the heart of colonialism. But beneath the costumes and the glare of publicity, this young Khoisan woman was a person who had been torn from her own culture and sacrificed to the whims of fashionable Europe. Nearly two centuries after her death, Saartjie made headlines once again when Nelson Mandela launched a campaign to have her remains returned to the land of her birth. In this brilliant, vividly written book, Rachel Holmes traces the full arc of Saartjie's extraordinary story-a story of race, eros, oppression, and fame that resonates powerfully today. Keine Bibliotheksbeschreibungen gefunden. |
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Google Books — Lädt ... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)305.48Social sciences Social Sciences; Sociology and anthropology Groups of people Women Women by social groupKlassifikation der Library of Congress [LCC] (USA)BewertungDurchschnitt:
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Book jacket says the author divides her time between London and Cape Town, so was in the perfect position to do local research for most of the important events of Saartje's life, and the degree of research was impressive.
I loved getting the details about Saartjie's stage costume - including the fact that she was NOT nude, the in-depth look at the relationships in her life and her family background. If you are interested in this woman, based on a clip you've seen on TV or a story floating the internet, this book is well worth a read. ( )