The Black Jacobins narrates the story of the Haitian revolution largely through its focus on one of its most critical figures Toussaint L'Ouverture. James narrates the military drama with a novelist’s eye for detail, psychological depth, and tension. His occasional asides to provide his own thoughts and connect the history to his times are revelatory and shrewd. It can be easy to be fatalistic about the rise of technofeudal fascism in our era, but during the Haitian revolution, a largely enslaved population had to shake off the chains of three imperial powers: the French, the Spanish, and the British. James spares no detail on the cruelty of the slaver’s torture tactics, from the burying of Africans to be devoured slowly by ants to the dogs to the branding. In some of its most moving passages, James narrates how in the last battles of the war, the generals told their men they did not need to fight with bravery but with an abandoned rage to survive and win; the formerly enslaved faced their deaths with an unhinged pride and resolution that stunned the colonizers. James astutely points out the catch-22: the enslaved were accused of being less than human for their “willingness” to accept slavery, but when they resisted it with all their might, sometimes petting the dogs sent to devour their limbs, other times placing the noose around their own necks at the gallows, they accused them of being incapable of feeling human pain, of being monstrous in their strength. I could say more, but you ought to just read it. 5 out of 5.