Sarah Farro

Sarah Farro is a little-documented African American writer associated with Chicago. Few dependable details of her life have survived, but her work places her within a small group of Black women who published fiction in the late nineteenth century, when access to mainstream publishing was limited. Farro’s appearance in print is notable in that context: her writing reached readers through a major New York publisher, rather than remaining solely in local or community circulation. The record is slender, so her one known book offers the clearest introduction to her literary interests and the conventions she worked within.

Farro’s best-known work is True Love: A Story of English Domestic Life. Its title signals an engagement with domestic themes and the popular sentimental traditions of the period. The book is notable, too, as an early example of a Black woman’s fiction issued by a mainstream publishing house. Because so little of Farro’s life and writing is documented, it is wise not to make broad claims about her style or influence; what remains is a valuable point of entry into the varied literary work of Black women writers in the 1890s. If you’re curious about that history, True Love is a good place to begin exploring her work in the app.