Accounts of Escape from Slavery Will be Read

The Emancipation Narratives of pre-Civil War America -- first-hand accounts of slaves who broke their bonds and escaped northward -- thrilled American readers and brought home the horrors of slavery in a vivid way.

At the Thursday, June 14, meeting of the Nook Farm Book Talks, to be held at The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center, participants will read selections from three of the more popular narratives written during Stowe's and Mark Twain's lifetime. The Stowe Center has made the narratives available online at http://bit.ly/LZE02M.

The Emancipation Narratives discussion will be facilitated by Lois Brown, Elizabeth Small Professor of English at Mount Holyoke College.

The discussion will be held at the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center, 77 Forest Street, Hartford, Conn., on Thursday, June 7. A 5:00 p.m. reception will be followed by the 5:30 p.m. discussion. The event is free, but registration is encouraged at 860-522-9258, Ext. 317.

Also, this Sunday, at 1pm the museum will announce the student winners of awards for their own artistic and literary reactions to the exhibit "Hateful Things," which provokes discussion of issues of race in America. The event is free.

Meanwhile, CitySingers of Hartford will perform "Songs of Spring and Such: Travels with Twain" at the museum on Saturday, June 2, at 3 pm. Admission to the concert is by voluntary offering.