Uncle Tom's Cabin

A novel of slavery in the American South, first published in 1850s America and soon read across the world. It follows Tom, an enslaved man of deep Christian faith, who is sold away from his family in Kentucky and sent further south. Alongside his story runs that of Eliza, a young mother who risks everything to escape with her child. Stowe shows how the system of slavery harms enslaved people, families and owners alike, and she appeals directly to the conscience of her readers. It was enormously influential in turning opinion against slavery, and it remains a landmark, and a debated one, in American literature.