Awards
2003 J. Anthony Lukas Prize for Nonfiction
Synopses & Reviews
The slave trade is one of the best known yet least understood processes in our history. The popular image of traders in slave ships going to Africa and rounding up slaves as if they were cattle is not only historically inaccurate, it also disguises the fact that the slave trade was a highly organized Atlantic-wide system that required close collaboration at the highest levels of government in Europe, Africa, and the New World. Using the private journal of First Lieutenant Robert Durand, and supplementing it with a wealth of archival research, Yale historian Robert Harms re-creates in astonishing detail the voyage of the French slave ship The Diligent. We have histories of the slave trade, most recently Hugh Thomas's massive and authoritative The Slave Trade, but The Diligent is something entirely different: a deep bore into the economic, political, and moral worldviews of the participants on all sides of the trade, complete with a vivid dramatis personae. Nobody who reads this book will ever look at the slave trade in the same way again.
Review
"The Diligent tracks the course of a trading ship that left Vannes, France in 1731 and headed for the coast of West Africa to sell goods and purchase slaves before sailing to Martinique, where the slaves were sold and sugar purchased for the return to France. Tracking the ship's movement through the journal of an officer on board, Harms re-creates the details of the journey
in intricate detail. In the process, he reveals the calculations and logic of the ship's captain and officers as they bought and sold human lives. Where most studies of the slave trade focus on a single area, Harms' book is a truly global history. Harms' title reveals perhaps his most important contribution—his narrative links the different but connected economies of France, West Africa, and the Caribbean. Contrasting recent scholars who argue for a single over-arching 'Atlantic economy,' Harms convincingly shows us a world composed of regions with distinct economic and moral systems." Reviewed by Andrew Witmer, Virginia Quarterly Review (Copyright 2006 Virginia Quarterly Review)
Review
"Over the past generation, French historians have documented this trade with remarkable conscientiousness. Now we have an excellent work that complements these histories." The Wall Street Journal
Review
"Fascinating and groundbreaking account." The Boston Globe
Review
"A compelling and illuminating narrative....An indispensable work of history....Harms is not the first to convey the cruelty of the slave traffic, but his vivid re-creation of this period is a remarkable achievement....For a sense of what the trade involved and how it was made possible, Harms's story is unrivaled." The Los Angeles Times
Review
"By fixing the French ship within the context of its 18th-century world, Harms explores part of a multilayered story....In doing so, he extends our understanding of the Atlantic slave trade by shedding light on new aspects of its tragic history." Publishers Weekly
Review
"This is compelling reading that will appeal to history buffs and those interested in how Africans were transported to the Americas." Vanessa Bush, Booklist
Review
"He takes the reader deep inside the politics, society, and economy of France, several West African peoples, Martinique, and more, showing how local interest determined the ways different people engaged in or became caught in the slave trade. It is a chilling history of the cold-bloodedness of people calculating their own profit trading in human cargo....History as it should be written." Library Journal
Review
"An original book that will endure....As a comprehensive and multilayered appreciation of the trade, The Diligent has no peer." The New York Times Book Review
Review
"A beautifully written, meticulously researched, compelling....Perhaps the author's greatest achievement...is his ability to place the 15-month voyage in a broader contextual framework. Moving back and forth in time, Harms discusses European trade, mercantilism and capitalism, as well as the use of cowrie shell (harvested from the Maldive Islands, near India) as currency in parts of West Africa." The Raleigh News & Observer (North Carolina)
Review
"A good old-fashioned narrative strongly flavored with interesting and easily verified details....[S]imply presents the unmistakable brutality, human waste, and everyday capitalist contradictions of the slave trade in its simplest terms....Imaginatively constructed, deftly and engagingly written, a model of research, the book takes the reader deep into the tragic heart of the eighteenth-century Atlantic." H Net Book Review
Review
"Extensive research combined with the best of a novelist's style gives the reader a look at slavery from the perspective of the participants and the cultural and historical details of their worlds. One of the best books of the 20th century for bringing the realities of slaving before a general audience." Choice
Synopsis
An original book that will endure.... As a comprehensive and multilayered appreciation of the [slave] trade, The Diligent has no peer. --New York Times Book Review.
Synopsis
The groundbreaking history of the Atlantic slave trade, winner of the Mark Lynton History Prize, the Frederick Douglass Book Prize, and the J. Russell Major Prize.
In The Diligent, acclaimed historian Robert Harms reveals the complex workings of the slave trade by drawing on the private journal of First Lieutenant Robert Durand to recreate the macabre journey of a French slave ship.
The Diligent began her journey in Brittany in 1731, and Harms follows her along the African coast where her goods were traded for slaves, then to Martinique where her captives were sold to work on sugar plantations. He brings to life a world in which slavery was carried out without qualms: the gruesome details of daily life aboard a slave ship, French merchants wrangling for the right to traffic in slaves, African kings waging epic wars for control of slave trading posts, and representatives of European governments negotiating the complicated politics of the Guinea coast to ensure a steady supply of labor for their countries' colonies.
By combining the detailed story of an expedition with an exploration of the significant personalities and events that were shaping Europe, West Africa, and the Caribbean in the early eighteenth century, The Diligent provides an intimate understanding of a horrifying world.
Synopsis
The Diligent began her journey in Brittany in 1731, and Harms follows her along the African coast where her goods were traded for slaves, to Martinique where her captives were sold to work on sugar plantations. Harms brings to life a world in which slavery was a commerce carried out without qualms. He shows the gruesome details of daily life aboard a slave ship, as well as French merchants wrangling with their government for the right to traffic in slaves, African kings waging epic wars for control of European slave trading posts, and representatives of European governments negotiating the complicated politics of the Guinea coast to ensure a stead supply of labor for their countries' colonies. The Diligent is filled with rich stories that explain how the slave trade worked on all levels, from geopolitics to the rigging of ships.
About the Author
Robert Harms is Professor of History at Yale University. He is a former director of the Yale African Studies Program and a member of the Board of the U.S. African Studies Association. He is the author of two books on Africa: River of Wealth, River of Sorrow and Games Against Nature. He lives in New Haven, Connecticut.