Review of The Slave Ship: A Human History by Marcus Rediker (penguin, 2006) - Book Report/Review Example

Eminent scholar and historian Marcus Rediker throws light onto a few of the most horrifying and dark avenues of history during the eighteenth century. “The Slave Ship: A Human History” is a revelation of Marcus’ effort of rigorous research of more than thirty years through the passage of countless maritime archives, records from court, entries in myriad journals and diaries and, most importantly, a thorough first-hand account which culminated into a history lost and forgotten with a few of the shivering accounts of tearful incidents and revelations that can bring shiver down the spine.

The history of dungeons floating and the precursory events of today’s African American Culture find a back to back and profound expression in this book that surpasses mere periphery and parameters of a chronicle. Thesis Statement This essay intends to explore the entirety of the book and the facts presented in “The Slave Ship: A Human History” by Marcus Rediker and tries to present a review of the text. The Slave Ship: A Human History: A Review Slaves were common phenomena in the plantation during the nineteenth century.

However, a general question arises concerning how these slaves appeared in the western hemisphere of the world. Rediker, in this aspect, imports his readers to a periphery which also focuses their mode of transportation to the west which took place through the slave ship. As the slaves were captivated and transported with the help of the ship, so a comprehensive study resulting into the detailed research and a concrete thesis presented through the book “The Salve Ship: A Human History” appeared before its readers in the form of the study of the vessel in which they were transported during the tenure of 1700 to 1808.

Every minute detail gets captivated in the book, the material with which the ship was made, its nature and characteristics, the details about the ship’s promoters, captains and cabin crews all get encapsulated very systematically within the pages of the book, “The Slave Story: A Human History”. The relation of the slaves with the captains and crews, the human cargo and the relation of the slave trade with the socio-economic and socio-cultural paradigm in the western world which is quite complex in nature find a very detailed and explicit expression in the book.

Rediker exposits, “how the slave ship worked as a machine to produce the commodity, ‘slave’ for a global labour market” (Rediker 338). The book is divided into 10 chapters, with a very ornate Introduction and an Epilogue named, ‘Endless Passage’. The chapters appear with the following names, ‘Life, Death, and Terror in the Slave Trade’, ‘The Evolution of the Slave Ship’, ‘African Paths to the Middle Passage’, ‘Olaudah Equiano: Astonishment and Terror’, ‘James Field Stan Field and the Floating Dungeon’, ‘John Newton and the Peaceful Kingdom’, ‘The Captain’s Own Hell’, ‘The Sailor’s Vast Machine’, ‘From Captives to Shipmates’, ‘The Long Voyage of the Slave Ship Brooks’ (Rediker 1-50).

The book is enlightening, engrossing and engaging but the most scintillating effect which the book brings on the comprehension of human mind regarding slave system is the breakdown of many conventional ideas related to the slave system since