Roots: The Saga of An American Family, Semi-biographical Novel

Roots: The Saga Of An American Family by Alex Haley
ISBN 9781593154493, Vanguard Press, USA, 2007


Highly popular literary work for its cultural, social and historical significance.  The book resulted in a successful TV adaptation and is memorable for its emotive scenes.  Although the author classifies his account as thoroughly researched genealogical record, with fictionalized or more accurately, recreated dialogue, scholars dispute the novel as historically improbable.  They suggest that the author's resources were elderly individuals whose memory fails them.  Family histories are often relied upon by spoken record however so Roots can be taken to be at least culturally important. Whatever the case, the novel captures the plight, trials and spirit of a people and it is a highly desirable piece of literature.  Its reception and influence on popular culture has been of impact, understandably so.


It is without dispute an interesting and captivating account that Haley says was passed on aurally from generation to generation and covers his family's tracks from 1767 when his ancestor Kunta Kinte was sold as a slave and shipped to America out of Gambia.


Haley's language is powerful, descriptive, highly ornamental and filled with vivid imagery.  As one reviewer suggests, the death rate of slaves-to-be who were forcefully taken from their fatherland and died on the ships before even reaching their destination, is enough of a shocking historical point.  In the reviewer's own words Roots as a concept deals with "the history of an entire race of people whose names and identities were stolen from them. It's hard to say if this book is fiction, history or biography, since it reads so much like all three."  The emotions Haley evokes are strong and his work should be celebrated as the endurance of the human spirit, seen in the resilience of the young Kinte and his denial to denounce his name or background.

http://www.rootsthebook.com