By turns entertaining and tragic, this elegant history reveals the
origins of a great university in the dilemmas of Virginia slavery.
Thomas Jefferson shares center stage with his family and fellow
planters, but at the crux are the enslaved black families on whom they
depend.
Taylor's account of Jefferson's campaign to save Virginia by building
the university is dramatic, a contest for power and resources rich in
political maneuver and eccentricities comic and cruel.