Roots: The Saga of an American Family
First edition cover
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| Author | Alex Haley |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Non-fiction |
| Publisher | Doubleday |
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Publication date
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17 August 1976 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback, paperback) |
| Pages | 704 pp (First edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | (First edition, hardback) |
| OCLC | 2188350 |
| 929/.2/0973 | |
| LC Class | E185.97.H24 A33 |
Roots: The Saga of an American Family is a novel written by Alex Haley and first published in 1976. It tells the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African, captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery in the United States, and later follows his life and the lives of his descendants in the United States down to Haley. The release of the novel, combined with its hugely popular television adaptation, Roots (1977), led to a cultural sensation in the United States, and it is considered to be one of the most important U.S. works of the 20th century. The novel spent months on The New York Times Best Seller List, including 22 weeks in the top spot on that list. The last seven chapters of the novel were later adapted in the form of a second miniseries, Roots: The Next Generations (1979). It stimulated interest in genealogy and appreciation for African American history.
Following the success of the novel and the miniseries, Haley was accused by two authors of plagiarism of their novels. Harold Courlander was able to prove that Roots was plagiarized from his novel The African, which was published nine years earlier. The resulting trial ended with an out-of-court settlement and Haley's admission that some passages within Roots had been copied from Courlander's work; Haley claimed this was unintentional. In a later interview with BBC Television, the presiding judge in Courlander's lawsuit against Haley said, "Alex Haley perpetrated a hoax on the public."
The book was originally described as "faction" and was sold in the non-fiction section of bookstores. Haley spent the last chapter of the book describing his research in archives and libraries to support his family's oral tradition with written records. However, historians and genealogists have found critical errors in his research work. Most of the novel is either unsupported or contradicted by the available evidence.
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