American Histories Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, Nat Turner's Rebellion and our BookBrowse Review of American Histories.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

1. In the "A Prefatory Note," John Edgar Wideman writes that his guess is that "slavery won't disappear until only two human beings left alive, neither one strong enough to enslave the other" (page 2). What does this statement lead you to believe about Wideman's definition of slavery, and how does that differ from your understanding of the concept?
   
2. In "JB & FD," John Brown and Frederick Douglass, a white and black abolitionist, respectively, each believe in the eradication of slavery, but they disagree about how to get there. What is the effect, at the story's end, of creating a black character named John Brown, after the figure who was, in life, the more militant of the two? How does this complicate the dialogue between the two men?
   
3. "My Dead" describes the narrator's relationship with his brother Otis, or Gene. What do you make of the relationship between the narrator, describing his complex feelings about a man with the author's last name, and the author himself?
   

Unless otherwise stated, this discussion guide is reprinted with the permission of Scribner. Any page references refer to a USA edition of the book, usually the trade paperback version, and may vary in other editions.