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I'm in room 133 of the Linden Row Inn, Richmond, Virginia. I probably don't need to remind you that Richmond was the home of the confederacy, the capital of the slavery-supporting American south, the first to stand and the last to fall. At least, that's what my guide informed me on a city-wide canal trip I took yesterday afternoon. It was a well-worn speech, but something in it aggressively grabbed my attention. It was the fascinating story of Henry "Box" Brown, an enslaved African who, on hearing that his wife and children had been sold away from him, had a friend nail his 5ft 8in frame into a cargo box and, posing as railway freight, posted himself to the north and, of course, freedom. The railroads being new and prone to delay, Brown arrived, having travelled sometimes upside down on his head, 36 hours later, barely alive. He went on to be a leading light in the abolitionist movement, travelling the length and breadth of the country in pursuit of freedom for his people.
As I listened to this story, I thought how easily Henry "Box" Brown could have been a character in a play by August Wilson. If he had cropped up in one of Wilson's cycle of 10 plays recording the black experience of the 20th century, though, Brown would probably still be alive - much like Aunt Ester, the 300-year-old matriarch who starred in Gems of the Ocean, chronologically the first of those 10. The nails from the box might be the only communication tool acceptable to the ancients gods of the motherland; they would use them to pull a lost soul back to the fold, make them once more the true emancipated soul he or she should be.
That was yesterday. Twenty minutes ago I picked up a text message that read: August Wilson has died....