The good that I have said of human servitude should be thrown into the scales with the evil that I have said of it. If I have portrayed the dark side of slavery, I also have painted the bright side. In writing as I have done, I am well aware that I have invited criticism but before the critic judges harshly, let my explanation be carefully read and weighed.

My life, so full of romance, may sound like a dream to the matter-of-fact reader, nevertheless everything I have written is strictly true much has been omitted, but nothing has been exaggerated. At last I have acceded to the importunities of my friends, and have hastily sketched some of the striking incidents that go to make up my history. DocSouth Books provide affordable and easily accessible editions to a new generation of scholars, students, and general readers.I have often been asked to write my life, as those who know me know that it has been an eventful one. Each book contains a short summary and is otherwise unaltered from the original publication. DocSouth Books uses the latest digital technologies to make these works available in paperback and e-book formats. This collaboration between UNC Press and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Library brings classic works from the digital library of Documenting the American South back into print. Biographers of the Lincolns have quoted extensively from Keckley's text. Scholars have acknowledged the book's valuable account of slave life as well as its intimate view into the Lincoln White House. Keckley's dressmaking business failed, the Lincoln family cut all ties with her, and she lived out her final days in a home for the indigent.

However, the book's publication prompted an even greater public outcry, with the added racial subtext of white society's disdain for Keckley's audacity in publishing details of the Lincolns' private lives. Behind the Scenes is, therefore, both a slave narrative and Keckley's attempt to defend the motives behind the auction. Lincoln's financial situation had worsened, Keckley helped organize an auction of the former first lady's dresses, eliciting strong criticism from members of the Washington elite. Several years after President Lincoln's assassination, when Mrs. She eventually became a close confidante of Mary Todd Lincoln. Keckley moved to Washington, D.C., where she worked as a seamstress and dressmaker for the wives of influential politicians. Behind the Scenes is the life story of Elizabeth Keckley, a shrewd entrepreneur who, while enslaved, raised enough money to purchase freedom for herself and her son.

Behind the scenes by elizabeth keckley