Episode Details

Plenty of slave narratives-both fictional and nonfictional—have documented the sexual exploitation of black slaves by whites and how it distorted relations between slave men and women.

However, almost nothing has been written about homosexuality among slaves, the extent to which it existed, and whether it was tolerated or punished.

In his novel “The Prophets”, Robert Jones Jr. explores the tender love story of Samuel and Isaiah, two teen-aged slaves on a Mississippi cotton plantation.

Imagining their inner lives, and the inner lives of those around them, the novel reveals the solace that their relationship brings them as well as the dangers it exposes them to.

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