Alexander Berkman

Reproduction of the original: Selected Works of Voltairine De Cleyre by Alexander Berkman

Reproduction of the original: Prison Memoirs of An Anarchist by Alexander Berkman

Reproduction of the original: Prison Memoirs of An Anarchist by Alexander Berkman

Upon their scandalous deportation from the United States in 1919, famous anarchist writers and activists Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman were greeted like heroes by the new Bolshevik government in Russia. Berkman described it as "the most sublime day of my life." And yet he would flee the country after only two years. Belarus-born Ida Mett, who went through a similar experience at the time, also wrote a harrowing account of the Red Army's brutal massacre at the Kronstadt Uprising before she too went into exile. How did each of these figures become so deeply disillusioned with Russia so quickly? And why, within a few years, did they all leave the country forever? 1917 offers a unique alternative perspective on the early years of the Russian Revolution through the narrative perspective of these three eyewitnesses. Featuring an introduction by Murray Bookchin, this book emphasizes the rarely discussed anarchist hopes for a democratic October revolution, while also critiquing the increasingly authoritarian responses of Bolshevik leaders at the time. Published for the centennial of the Russian revolutions, 1917 contains four essays by Emma Goldman, Alexander Berkman, Ida Mett, and Bookchin, as well as a poem by Dan Georgakas, that analyze, assess, celebrate, and bemoan both the wild successes and the bitter failures of the revolution.

Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist is Alexander Berkman's account of his experience in prison in Western Penitentiary of Pennsylvania, in Pittsburgh, from 1892 to 1906. First published in 1912 by Emma Goldman's Mother Earth press, it has become a classic in autobiographical literature. Story The book begins with the details of how Berkman came to be imprisoned: as an anarchist activist, he had attempted to assassinate wealthy industrialist Henry Clay Frick, manager of the Carnegie steel works in Pennsylvania. Frick had been responsible for crushing the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers during the Homestead Strike, in which nine union workers and seven guards were killed. However, although Berkman shot Frick two times -Berkman was subdued before the third shot- and stabbed him several times in the leg with a poisoned knife, Frick survived, and Berkman was sentenced to 22 years in prison. Berkman had hoped to awaken the consciousness of the oppressed American people-an attentat-but, as the book goes on to detail, America lacked the political culture to interpret his actions. Even fellow prisoners from the union he was defending failed to see his political intent. The bulk of the book is set during Berkman's years in prison. Written in first-person, present-tense English (a language that was new to Berkman), it reads like a diary, though it was in fact written after Berkman's release. It is a coming-of-age story that tracks Berkman's difficult loss of his youthful sentimental idealism as he struggles with the physical and psychological conditions of prison life, at times bringing him to the verge of suicide. As he gets to know the other prisoners, he has nothing but disdain and disgust for them as people, though he sees them as victims of an unjust system. "They are not of my world", he writes. "I would aid them", he says, being "duty bound to the victims of social injustice. But I cannot be friends with them ... they touch no chord in my heart." Gradually, though, Berkman's self-imposed distance and moral high ground begins to crumble as he comes to see the flawed humanity in everyone, including himself. The Prison Memoirs is also, in part, a tribute to his relationship with fellow anarchist Emma Goldman, to whom he refers repeatedly throughout the book as "the Girl". 2] She is the only person to maintain correspondence with Berkman in prison, and defends him from criticism on the outside, helping him upon his release. The book tracks the development of Berkman's ideas on political violence, and his ruminations often read like a dialog with Goldman, whom he knows intimately. One of the notable features of the Prison Memoirs is its treatment of homosexuality in prison. Carol Douglas, writing of the book in off our backs, says that Berkman "described how his initial horror at homosexuality in the prison where he was confined gave way to love for another man". 3] In his 2008 study, Free Comrades: Anarchism and Homosexuality in the United States, 1895-1917, Terence Kissack describes Prison Memoirs as "one of the most important political texts dealing with homosexuality to have been written by an American before the 1950s"..... Alexander Berkman (November 21, 1870 - June 28, 1936) was a leading member of the anarchist movement in the early 20th century, famous for both his political activism and his writing. Berkman was born in Vilna in the Russian Empire (present-day Vilnius, Lithuania) and emigrated to the United States in 1888. He lived in New York City, where he became involved in the anarchist movement. He was the one-time lover and lifelong friend of anarchist Emma Goldman. In 1892, undertaking an act of propaganda of the deed, Berkman made an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate businessman Henry Clay Frick, for which he served 14 years in prison.....

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

"A book of rare power and beauty, majestic in its structure, filled with the truth of imagination and the truth of actuality, emphatic in its declarations and noble in its reach."--Bayard Boyesen, Mother Earth. "No other book discusses so frankly the criminal ways of the closed prison society."-- Kenneth RexrothIn 1892, Alexander Berkman tried to assassinate Henry Clay Frick for the latter's role in violently suppressing the Homestead Steel Strike. Berkman's attempt was unsuccessful. Berkman spent the next fourteen years in Pennsylvania's Western Penitentiary. Upon release, he wrote what was to become a classic of prison literature, and a profound testament to human courage in the face of oppression. This new edition of his account of those years is introduced and fully annotated by Barry Pateman and Jessica Moran, both former associate editors of the Emma Goldman Papers at the University of California Berkeley. Their efforts make this the definitive version of Berkman's tale of his transformation within prison, his growing sympathy for those he'd considered social parasites, and the intimate relationships he developed with them. Also includes never-before-published facsimile reprints and transcriptions of the diary Berkman kept while he wrote this book, conveying the difficulties he had reliving his experiences. Alexander Berkman (1870-1936) was a leading writer and militant in the anarchist movement and author of the classic primer What is Anarchism? Barry Pateman was associate editor of Emma Goldman: A Documentary History, and editor of Chomsky on Anarchism. He is a historian and member of the Kate Sharpley Library collective. Jessica Moran, was an assistant editor of Emma Goldman: A Documentary History. She is a member of the Kate Sharpley Library collective and is an archivist currently living and working in New Zealand.

L'auteur de ce Journal, sans doute le seul a avoir ete tenu en Russie durant ces annees memorables (1920-1922), n'est ni un reactionnaire, ni un conservateur, ni un liberal, mais un revolutionnaire communiste anarchiste, un enthousiaste de la Revolution. Comme il l'ecrit, Octobre 1917 a ete pour lui le plus grand evenement de sa vie, le moment inoui ou toutes ses aspirations a l'emancipation humaine etaient soudain susceptibles de s'accomplir, d'etre enfin satisfaites. D'ou la question: comment, par quelles voies un enthousiaste de la revolution de 1917 a-t-il pu ecrire un livre qui a pour titre: Le Mythe bolchevik, et pour visee une demystification informee et impitoyable de cet evenement qui a constitue jusqu'en 1989 un des piliers de notre monde, de notre horizon historique ? C'est qu'en depit de son enthousiasme pour Octobre, Alexandre Berkman n'accepta pas davantage une soumission sans reserve au bolchevisme. Il choisit le role de collaborateur et d'observateur critique qui, au fil des mois et des evenements, se transforma peu a peu en une position plus en retrait, celle d'un guetteur averti, inquiet, soucieux de percevoir le ou les moments ou l'evenement revolutionnaire s'exposait a basculer soudain en son contraire, quand une forme d'opposition a la revolution nait de l'interieur de la Revolution (Karl Korsch). Historiquement, la particularite du bolchevisme est d'etre contemporain de la forme institutionnelle inedite qui le nie, a savoir les Soviets contre l'Etat qui pretend a tort s'identifier a la Revolution. Le journal de Berkman fait apparaitre le sans-precedent du bolchevisme: comment la contrerevolution s'exerce contre une inventivite revolutionnaire nouvelle, les conseils d'ouvriers et de paysans, et a Cronstadt, en 1921, le Comite revolutionnaire de marins et de soldats, ecrase au moment meme ou l'on celebrait l'anniversaire de la Commune de Paris. Voila pourquoi le livre que vous tenez entre les mains est exceptionnel. Il porte, au-dela d'Octobre, une autre vision de l'histoire du vingtieme siecle et, du meme coup, une autre apprehension du present.

År 1926 bad Judiska Anarkistfederationen den kända anarkisten Alexander Berkman att skriva en introduktion till anarkismen ämnad för den breda allmänheten. Resultatet blev “Anarkismens ABC” som gavs ut 1929 och som idag anses vara en klassisk deklaration av den anarkistiska rörelsens mål och medel. För de som har frågor om anarkismen så presenterar Berkman svar på ett lysande enkelt sätt. Genom boken diskuterar Berkman samhället och varför anarkismen är en nödvändighet, myterna kring rörelsen och de oumbärliga förberedelserna för att med framgång uppnå revolutionen som kommer att utmynna i anarki. ”Folk behöver en nybörjarbok om anarkismen, en ABC så att säga, som kan lära dem de grundläggande anarkistiska principerna och stimulera deras aptit för något mer djupgående. Anarkismens ABC var menad för detta ändamål. Att den har fullbordat sitt syfte kommer ingen som har läst denna lilla bok att förneka.” - Emma Goldman