Synopses & Reviews
A moving story of love and human struggle; a faithful account of the watershed event in U.S. labor history; a layered and dynamic revelation of late 19th century Chicago, and of a handful of remarkable individuals who fought and some who died for human dignity as an inalienable right.
Synopsis
A historically faithful first novel that brings to life late nineteenth-century Chicago and a handful of remarkable individuals who were willing to dedicate and ultimately give up their lives for what they believed in: human dignity for every person. On the night of May 4, 1886, during a peaceful demonstration in Haymarket Square in Chicago, a dynamite bomb was thrown into the ranks of police trying to disperse the crowd. The officers immediately opened fire, killing a number of protestors and wounding some two hundred others. At a time of bitter class war and a groundswell of working-class radicalism, the Haymarket Riot produced a wave of hysteria across the nation, leading ultimately to the trial and hanging of the leaders of the anarchist/socialist movement. Albert Parsons was the best-known of those hung; "Haymarket is his story. Lucy Gonzalez was the outspoken black woman with whom he fell in love. The novel tells the story of their lives together, of their growing political involvement, of their colorful circle of "co-conspirators"--immigrants, radical intellectuals, journalists, advocates of the working class--and of the events culminating in bloodshed.
Synopsis
A stunning historical novel built around the 1886 clash that shook the country.
About the Author
Martin Duberman is Distinguished Professor of History at The City University of New York, and the author of some twenty books. They include Charles Francis Adams (winner of The Bancroft Prize); James Russell Lowell (a finalist for The National Book Award), the co-edited Hidden From History (winner of two Lambda Book Awards), Paul Robeson (winner of several prizes, including the NYPL's George Freedley Memorial Award for the "best book of the year"); Black Mountain: An Exploration in Community; Cures; and Left Out: Collected Essays. Among Duberman's other awards are: a Special Prize from the National Academy of Arts and Sciences for his "contributions to literature,"and the Manhattan Borough President's Gold Medal in Literature. Duberman is also a playwright. His first play, "In White America,"won the Vernon Rice/Drama Desk Award, and his play on the life of Emma Goldman ("Mother Earth")has recently been show-cased at The New York Theater Workshop. "Visions of Kerouac,"his play about the Beat generation, opens at the Marin Theatre Company on May 13, 2003. Duberman is currently at work on the authorized biography of Lincoln Kirstein, under contract to Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. He has been given exclusive access to the vast, and previously sealed, Kirstein Archives at Lincoln Center.