History Literature / Roots

[[quoteright:258:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/haley_roots.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:258:The book that started it all.]]
->"...[J]oin me in the hope that this story of our people can help alleviate the legacies of the fact that preponderantly the histories have been written by the winners."

A Pulitzer Prize winning historical novel that describes, with varying degrees of accuracy, the tragedies and triumphs of the known direct ancestors of author Alex Haley, highlighting each one of them in turn with the narrative.

A Pulizer Prize winning historical novel that describes, with varying degrees of accuracy, the tragedies and triumphs of the known direct ancestors of author Alex Haley, highlighting each one of them in turn with the narrative.

From there, it follows Kunta's life for many years, being owned first by the cruel John Waller, who renamed Kunta to Toby (though Kunta would never recognize the name as his), then sold to John's brother the kinder (but still staunch slaver) William Waller, and from there to his marriage to the house cook Bell and the birth of his daughter Kizzy. The narrative then flows to follow both Kunta and Kizzy, taking special care to note that Kunta would tell Kizzy stories about his life in Africa whenever the opportunity arose, and taught her some words in his native Mandinka language. The story follows them both until Kizzy is sold away from her parents to a plantation in another state, after which the narrative then follows her alone until the birth of her own child, George, who was [[ChildOfRape born as a result of frequent raping]] by her new master Tom Lea.

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: The first time the reader meets Master Tom Lea, he's drunk out of his mind and rapes his new slave, Kizzy.

It starts with the birth of Kunta Kinte, a typical boy from the village of Juffure, who, after [[RiteOfPassage manhood training]], grew up to become a reasonably successful farmer and trader. Around age 17, after his night watch duties, he wandered into the nearby forest to chop some wood to make a drum for one of his brothers. There, he was attacked and captured by four slave traders who hauled him away.

* MeaningfulName: Kizzy. In Mandinka, the name (properly "Kiese") means "to stay put." Kunta used it as a kind of incantation to ensure she would never be sold away from her family. The trope is thoroughly, brutally [[SubvertedTrope subverted]].

* AdultFear: Time and again, the fear of family members being taken away, never to be seen again, is the ultimate horror. Kunta was stolen from his family, and then his own daughter Kizzy was sold away from him. Kizzy's son and grandchildren, and all their families, were sold away from Kizzy. Chicken George almost suffered this fate during his stint in England -- his family was sold away from him, but on his return he managed to get Tom Lea drunk enough to spill the beans as to their current whereabouts, and found the freedom papers Lea had written out for him before getting shipped off.

* TrainingFromHell: The Mandinka "manhood training" is considered this by boys who have not experienced it, and to some extent by boys going through it. That said, the boys who are going through it tend to harden and adapt fairly quickly, and learn to love the hardened instructor and instruction by the end of it. At least until the circumcision, anyway.

* MeaningfulName: Kizzy. In Mandinka, the name (properly "Kiese") means "to stay put." Kunta used it as a kind of incantation to ensure she would never be sold away from her family. The trope is thoroughly, and brutally, [[SubvertedTrope subverted]].

* WorkOffTheDebt: In one of the most horrible fashions imaginable. Tom Lea loses both his entire estate and Chicken George's life savings in a cockfighting wager with an English nobleman. Rather than give up his plantation to repay the remaining debt, he doesn't do anything himself, but rather sends Chicken George to England for five years to work as a gamecock trainer. He promises to repay Chicken George's loss, both financial and familial, by granting him his freedom on return. Instead, he sells off Chicken George's entire family and conveniently forgets about the offer of freedom.

* FreudianExcuse: Tom Lea tries to justify his ways to Chicken George by explaining that he grew up dirt poor, that he only has what wealth he does because he has worked so much harder than anyone he knows, and that his worthless relatives all come begging for money and favors, then sneer at him behind his back. Chicken George feels kind of sad for Lea that his family is terrible, but isn't really convinced that Lea got everything he has by being such a hard worker.

* UncleTomfoolery: Discussed and exploited. Chicken George and his son Tom both mention that it's one of the ways that black slaves can stay out of trouble -- by appearing more foolish and silly than they actually are, they can mitigate a master's wrath.

* ValuesDissonance: Beyond all the obvious ones in a book rife with slavery, the book spends a fair amount of time glorifying cockfighting.

* IronWoobie: Almost every single slave in Kunta's line, by blood or by marriage, endures the suffering far beyond what any normal human possibly could.

* CompleteMonster: Master Tom Lea. He's mean, callous, quick to anger, frequently drunk, and rapes his slave women without a second thought. The book notes that he gives Kizzy a dime or quarter every time he rapes her; Chicken George notices as a child that the weird jar of coins his mother kept by her bed grew quite full over the years.

* AdultFear: Time and again, the fear of family members being taken away, never to be seen again, is the ultimate horror. Kunta was stolen from his family, and then his own daughter Kizzy was sold away from him. Kizzy's son and grandchildren, and all their families, were sold away from Kizzy.

* HopeSpot: By the bushel, but this is the South while slavery was in full swing. Every time it looks like Kunta or one of his descendants is about to get free, or at least get something good in life, [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption reality bites them hard]].

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: After Kizzy is sold away, we never hear from Kunta or Bell again. Justified in that Kizzy never saw her parents again after being sold, and would have no more stories to tell of them.

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: The first time the reader meets Master Tom Lea, he's drunk out of his mind and rapes his new slave, Kizzy. He's mean, callous, quick to anger, frequently drunk, and rapes his slave women without a second thought. The book notes that he gives Kizzy a dime or quarter every time he rapes her, and George notices as a child that the jar of coins his mother kept by her bed grew quite full over the years.

* AdultFear: Time and again, the fear of family members being taken away, never to be seen again, is the ultimate horror. Kunta was stolen from his family, and then his own daughter Kizzy was sold away from him. Kizzy's son and grandchildren, and all their families, were sold away from Kizzy. The oral history
* BasedOnAGreatBigLie: Not intentionally, but much of the work is admittedly a product of the author's imagination, and some of the independent documentation of the family history was not as rigorous as it should have been. It's possible that he has the wrong slave ship, and it's almost certain that the oral historian ("griot") he listened to in Africa was telling Haley a story that he knew Haley wanted to hear, not necessarily the truth.

* UncleTomfoolery: Discussed and exploited. Chicken George and his son Tom both mention that it's one of the ways that black slaves can stay out of trouble -- by appearing more foolish and silly than they actually are, they can mitigate a master's wrath.

* AllBasedOnAGreatBigLie: Not intentionally, but much of the work is admittedly a product of the author's imagination, and some of the independent documentation of the family history was not as rigorous as it should have been. It's possible that he has the wrong slave ship, and it's almost certain that the oral historian ("griot") he listened to in Africa was telling Haley a story that he knew Haley wanted to hear, not necessarily the truth.

Haley then wrote the book, filling in from his imagination all the parts that couldn't be verified (primarily conversation and some filler events), but noting that, to the best of his knowledge and study, the lineage information was accurate. His stated goal was for the book to be a kind of analogue for all American blacks who had lost their family histories through the brutality and dehumanization of slavery. He knew he was incredibly lucky that any shred of his African heritage had survived the systemic suppression of the Slave Codes and of families being torn apart by sale, and that most black Americans have no way to tell such a story.

The book concludes with Alex Haley describing the research he did to verify independently as much of his family's story as he could, claiming that through written records and oral history from the region he identified as the likeliest place of Kinte's birth he was able to piece together enough of the story to know the tales had to be at least mostly true -- that a Mandinka named Kunta Kinte had disappeared without a trace, that a slave ship called the ''Lord Ligonier'' had traveled from that land to Annapolis, Maryland at the time Kunta would have been around 17, and that a John Waller had sold land and a slave named Toby to his brother William. He also found a census form with Tom Haley, blacksmith, on it -- Cynthia's father -- from the town in Tennessee where Chicken George was said to have taken the entire family after Emancipation.

From there, it follows Kunta's life for many years, being owned first by the cruel John Waller and then his brother the kinder (but still staunch slaver) William Waller, and from there to his marriage to the house cook Bell and the birth of his daughter Kizzy. The narrative then flows to follow both Kunta and Kizzy, taking special care to note that Kunta would tell Kizzy stories about his life in Africa whenever the opportunity arose, and taught her some words in his native Mandinka language. The story follows them both until Kizzy is sold away from her parents to a plantation in another state, after which the narrative then follows her alone until the birth of her own child, George, who was [[ChildOfRape born as a result of frequent raping]] by her new master Tom Lea.

The book concludes with Alex Haley describing the research he did to verify independently as much of his family's story as he could, claiming that through written records and oral history from the region he identified as the likeliest place of Kinte's birth he was able to piece together enough of the story to know the tales had to be at least mostly true. He then wrote the book, filling in from his imagination all the parts that couldn't be verified (primarily conversation and some filler events), but noting that, to the best of his knowledge and study, the lineage information was accurate.

Haley's stated goal was for the book to be

The book that started it all. A Pulizer Prize winning historical novel that describes, with varying degrees of accuracy, the tragedies and triumphs of the known ancestors of author Alex Haley.

From there, it follows Kunta's life for many years, being owned first by the cruel John Waller and then his brother the kinder (but still staunch slaver) William Waller, and from there to the birth of his daughter Kizzy. The narrative then flows to follow both Kunta and Kizzy, taking special care to note that Kunta would tell Kizzy stories about his life in Africa whenever the opportunity arose, and taught her some words in his native Mandinka language. The story follows them both until Kizzy is sold away from her parents to a plantation in another state, after which the narrative then follows her alone until the birth of her own child, George, who was [[ChildOfRape born as a result of frequent raping]] by her new master Tom Lea.

One of Chicken George's boys, Tom, was a little different than the rest of the children. He was quiet, reserved, and thoughtful, very much unlike his boisterous and gregarious father or his sullen and cranky brothers. He turned out to have a natural talent for blacksmithing, and after gaining freedom from the end of the [[UsefulNotes/TheAmericanCivilWar Civil War]] and the whole family moving to Tennessee, he became a very successful traveling smith. He ultimately has seven children of his own, and like his father before him, at each birth he brought in the entire extended family to retell all the stories and Mandinka words of their African great-great grandfather Kunta Kinte.