Memoir
Bone Black
bell hooks
Fragmentary memories trace the making of a writer in a Black Southern family.
Collection
Biographies & Untold Stories
Follow lives in context through biographies, memoirs, and oral histories.
The shelves
Books in this collection
Memoir
Taking Flight
Michaela DePrince, Elaine DePrince
DePrince recalls her path from Sierra Leone to ballet training and professional performance.
Picture book
Alvin Ailey
Andrea Davis Pinkney
A picture-book biography introduces Ailey’s childhood and the movement language he brought to the stage.
Memoir
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Maya Angelou
Angelou revisits a childhood divided among homes, shaped by Southern segregation and the struggle to speak.
Memoir
Mom & Me & Mom
Maya Angelou
Angelou looks back on the complicated reunion and enduring bond with her mother, Vivian Baxter.
Oral history
Barracoon
Zora Neale Hurston
Hurston records Cudjo Lewis’s account of captivity, the Atlantic crossing, and life in Africatown.
Memoir
The Big Sea
Langston Hughes
Hughes remembers childhood, travel, and the artists and arguments around the Harlem Renaissance.
Memoir
Men We Reaped
Jesmyn Ward
Ward links the deaths of five men she knew to the pressures shaping life in her Mississippi community.
History
The Warmth of Other Suns
Isabel Wilkerson
Three lives trace the distinct routes and consequences of the Great Migration.
Memoir
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass
Douglass describes enslavement, his pursuit of literacy, and his emergence as an abolitionist.
Memoir
My Bondage and My Freedom
Frederick Douglass
Douglass revisits the details of his enslavement and expands on his life in the abolitionist movement.
Memoir
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Harriet Jacobs
Jacobs recounts exploitation, years spent in hiding, and her efforts to secure freedom for her children.
Memoir
Up from Slavery
Booker T. Washington
Washington recounts his path from enslavement to leadership at Tuskegee and sets out his educational philosophy.
Memoir
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Malcolm X, Alex Haley
Malcolm X recounts the institutions, encounters, and journeys that transformed his political and religious life.
Memoir
Assata
Assata Shakur
Shakur recounts her upbringing, political organizing, imprisonment, and experiences with the legal system.
Graphic memoir
March: Book One
John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, Nate Powell
The first volume traces Lewis’s childhood and the organizing that led to the Nashville lunch-counter sit-ins.
Memoir
Walking with the Wind
John Lewis, Michael D'Orso
Lewis recalls the practical training, collective decisions, and personal risks behind movement campaigns.
Biography
Dream Boogie
Peter Guralnick
A biography follows Cooke from gospel performance into popular music and independent business ventures.
Biography
Moanin' at Midnight
James Segrest, Mark Hoffman
Howlin’ Wolf’s biography follows his path from Mississippi to the Chicago electric blues scene.
Biography
King of the Blues
Daniel de Visé
B. B. King’s life connects rural beginnings, touring labor, and the international reach of electric blues.
Memoir
Miles
Miles Davis, Quincy Troupe
Davis recounts the bands, relationships, and musical changes that shaped his career.
Biography
John Coltrane: His Life and Music
Lewis Porter
Porter places Coltrane’s musical practice and innovations alongside the events and relationships of his life.
Biography
Duke
Terry Teachout
The life of Duke Ellington opens onto the daily business of maintaining a touring orchestra.
Memoir
Music Is My Mistress
Duke Ellington
Ellington remembers the musicians, places, and collaborations behind his work as a bandleader.
Biography
Princess Noire
Nadine Cohodas
The book follows Simone’s musical education, performance career, and political commitments.
Biography
Respect
David Ritz
A biography examines the gospel inheritance and recording career behind Franklin’s public sound.
Memoir
Mo' Meta Blues
Questlove, Ben Greenman
A musician and bandleader remembers a life shaped by records, influences, and collaborations.
Memoir
Life in Motion
Misty Copeland
Copeland recounts discovering ballet and finding her way through its demanding institutions.
Biography
Katherine Dunham
Joyce Aschenbrenner
Dunham’s work in anthropology and choreography illuminates a major exchange between research and performance.
History
Hidden Figures
Margot Lee Shetterly
Black women mathematicians navigate segregated workplaces while doing work central to American aviation and spaceflight.
Biography
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Rebecca Skloot
The story of HeLa cells follows the collision of biomedical research, consent, and one family’s search for answers.
Picture book
The Doctor with an Eye for Eyes
Julia Finley Mosca
A picture-book biography follows physician and inventor Patricia Bath and her work in eye care.
Biography
Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History
Vashti Harrison
Brief illustrated profiles introduce Black women whose work changed science, arts, and public life.
Memoir
Brown Girl Dreaming
Jacqueline Woodson
Woodson remembers growing up between South Carolina and New York in verse attentive to family stories.
Memoir
Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts
Crystal Wilkinson
Recipes and recollections connect Appalachian foodways with the stories of Black women across generations.
Memoir
Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave
William Wells Brown
Brown describes enslavement and escape, illuminating a life that began near Lexington and led into abolitionism.
Memoir
The Heart of a Woman
Maya Angelou
Angelou recalls work in the arts and civil rights organizing while raising her son.
Biography
Looking for Lorraine
Imani Perry
Perry connects Hansberry’s theatre work with her political thought, private life, and artistic networks.