Free shipping on all items to the UK. Carefully packed and prompt delivery.             

VISION ON FIRE: Emma Goldman on the Spanish Revolution

Price: £13.00
ISBN 10: 
1904859577
ISBN 13: 
9781904859574
Library of Congress Control No.: 
2006920975
Number of pages: 
347
First published: 
1983
This edition: 
2006
Blurb: 

This expertly chosen collection features the most important writings from the turbulent last four years of Emma Goldman's life. Vision on Fire is the perfect compliment to her celebrated autobiography, Living My Life, and for those readers inspired by her powerful collection, Anarchism and Other Essays. David Porter reveals Goldman's struggles with the contradictions of the Spanish Revolution and her efforts to maintain integrity and vision in the heat of political activism. Contemporary readers will find Vision on Fire a high-caliber history book, as well as an honest depiction of the complex world of libertarian revolution.

As an official representative of the CNT-FAI during the revolution, Emma Goldman made three trips to Spain to observe first-hand the most thoroughgoing social revolution in history. Her selected writings not only chronicle the debates, fights, and revolutionary zeal of the Spanish Revolution, but provide a sophisticated dialogue concerning revolution and social change--a dialogue which activists will turn to again and again as we confront these same issues in our own times, under new circumstances. The chapters cover: the Spanish anarchist movement; collective experiments in industry, agriculture, and education; collaboration with the republican government; Communist sabotage of the revolution; the fight against fascism; anarchists, violence, and war; women in the Spanish Revolution; and overall assessments of the Spanish Revolution and the international anarchist movement.

Contents: 

Four quotes by Emma Goldman
Acknowledgements (1983 Edition)
Preface to the Second Edition
Original Preface
Chronology of Leading Events

I. Introduction: Emma Goldman's Life and Involvment with Spain

II. The Spanish Anarchist Movement
    General Observations
    Particular Individuals

III. The New Society
    General Observations
    Socialized Industry
    Collectivized Agriculture
    Education and Culture
    Emergency Social Relief
    Collectivization in Exile

IV. Collaboration with Statist Forces

V. Communist Sabotage of the Spanish Revolution

VI. The International Context
    International Significance of the Spanish Anti-Fascist Civil War and the Politics of "Neutrality"
    Appeals for International Support

VII. Anarchists, Violence, and War

VIII. The Role of Women in the Spanish Revolution

IX. Overall Assessments of the Spanish Revolution

X. General Reflections on Anarchism and the Movement

Map of Spain
Sources
Index

Biographical note(s): 

David Porter recently retired from forty years of teaching politics, for the past twenty-seven at SUNY/Empire State College. Since the 1960s, he has written numerous articles about revolution and anarchism, first inspired and educated in that decade by the vision and realities of the Algerian revolution, Algeria's experiment with workers' self-management, May '68 in France, and the various North American liberatory movements at that time.

Quotes about: 

"Anyone interested in the history of the Left in the 20th century, anyone sensitive to the terrible drama of the Spanish Revolution, anyone who responds to the trenchant charm of Emma Goldman's mind will welcome David Porter's book." -- Ursula Le Guin

"Vision on Fire is a historical treasure, in which nuggets of personal and political comment in Emma Goldman's letters are interspersed with Porter's rich background notes. I found the book fascinating in what it reveals, not only about Emma Goldman and the ideas of anarchism, but also about the Spanish Revolution, and the lives of so many extraordinary individuals who participated at that time in the world-wide struggle for justice." -- Howard Zinn

"David Porter has assembled an invaluable sourcebook on this important phase of Emma Goldman's life and thought that until now has been badly neglected." -- Alix Kates Shulman

"It is a real treat to have Emma Goldman's writings on the Spanish Civil War made available, anew, in our contemporary context. Her vision is, as ever, inspiring. And David Porter's new preface demonstrates why we need Goldman's compelling analytical perspective now more than ever." -- Martha Ackelsberg

"Emma Goldman described the efforts of Spanish workers and peasants to build and defend an anarchist society 'with almost bare hands and every hindrance in their way' as 'an inspiration one cannot easily forget'. It is a rare and intensely moving experience to witness, through her eyes, their constructive achievements and their travail, caught between the Fascist hammer and the Communist anvil, ignored or vilified by Western 'progressives'. In the material he has found and presented, and in his own informative and insightful commentary, David Porter has made a very significant contribution to the never-ending struggle for freedom and justice." -- Noam Chomsky