摘要

二十年前，当《根》风靡美国的时候，它是被列在"非小说类畅销书"中的。1977年4月，美国国家书籍奖金委员会把历史特等奖授予了《根》，以表彰这部"非虚构的历史作品"。但是它二十年来在全世界的流传表明，读者们通常并不是把《根》当作一般意义的历史来阅读，他们更多的是沉浸在对《根》所描述的家族命运的关切之中，为它深刻的主题、活生生的形象和丰富的情感所打动。《根》更应该是一部文学作品，是一部优秀的历史小说。
回顾美国文学，以最敏感的黑人问题为题材的作品已形成了一个专门的类别，据说其中是《汤姆叔叔的小屋》、《飘》和《根》影响最大，最有代表性。其实，前两部作品还不能和《根》相比，完全以黑人的生活为主要情节且以黑人为主人公的作品，《根》是有开创意义的。尤其它的独特的叙述方式，"从头道来"，从"根"挖起，以一代代黑人的命运，以他们的苦难和追求，雄辩地展示了主题，赋予了《根》以史诗的光辉。
经过十二年的探索，作者终于找到了自己的"根"。是不是找到了自己祖先的村落也就真正找到了自己的尊严和价值了呢？恐怕不尽如此。美国的黑人问题是一个社会问题，而种族问题只是这个问题的标签。找到了种族意义上的根，并不等于找到了解决这个社会问题的根。
本文将从《根》挖掘了一条美国黑人之根，这条根开始在1750年早春，西非冈比亚河上的嘉福村。这是作者所称由他上推七代的祖先降生之地，这条根也是所有美国黑人之根的代表和象征。《根》更突出了美国黑人精神上所受的虐待，那种失去了人的尊严而给心灵带来的痛苦。书中反复地指出：人最宝贵的东西，是知道自己是什么人，是从哪儿来的。同时《根》也必然触及美国白人之根，从这个寻根过程反映美国人的现代精神，美国文化的精髓，美国发展的根本，即整个美国的根。

关键词：《根》，黑人，奴隶制，美国历史，美国文化

Abstract

Twenty years ago, when Roots swept the U.S., it is listed in the "non-fiction bestseller". In April 1977, Haley earned a Pulitzer Prize special award in 1977 for Roots from the U.S. National Committee on its historical attributes. But the past two decades’ wide spread throughout the world means that the reader usually don’t read Roots as a general history book, they are more immersed in the concern for the family fate described and touched by its deep themes, vivid images and rich emotions. Roots should be a literary work firstly, and an excellent historical novel.
Reviewing American literature, we can see works themed on the most sensitive issue of black have formed a special category, of which Uncle Tom's Cabin, Gone with the Wind, and Roots have the greatest impact and are the most representative. In fact, the former two works cannot be compared to Roots, which is groundbreaking of completely taking blacks’ lives as the main plot and the black for the hero of the work. In particular, its unique narration style of starting from scratch, beginning from the root to show the fate,  their suffering and pursue of black people from generation to generation, , which demonstrates the theme eloquently and let Roots be the glorious epic.
After 12 years’ exploration, the author has finally found his "root." But whether finding the village of his ancestors means finding their true dignity and value or not? It’s not so. The American black problem is a social problem. Finding the root of racial sense does not mean finding the root of solving this social problem.
This paper starts from the Roots of tapping out the root of the black American, which started in early spring 1750, on the Gambia River in West Africa, village of Juffure. This is the land where the author’s seventh generation ancestor was born; meanwhile this root is representative and symbolic of the root of all African-American. Roots prominently reflects the mental abuse the black Americans suffered, that loss of human dignity caused deep pain to the heart. The book repeatedly points out: the most precious thing is to know who we are and where we are coming from. At the same time, Roots certainly touches the root of white Americans. The process to find root reflects the root of modern American spirit, the essence of American culture, the United States of development, the root of the whole United States.

Key words: Roots,  the black,  slavery,  American history,  American culture