Radical Novel Reconsidered – serie

The story of a young, aspiring Jewish woman from the ghetto who will do anything to get her man in this case an upper-class WASP. When she discovers he is not really what she wanted, she will do anything to get away. Based on the real-life story of the Jewish immigrant activist Rose Pastor's fairytale romance with the millionaire socialist Graham Stokes, the novel also reflects Yezierska's own doomed romance with the famous educator John Dewey. Passionate and engagingly sardonic, it criticizes the concept of the American "Melting Pot" in the language of the Lower East Side and exposes the hypocrisy of the "good works" of the privileged class and their so-called dedication to the poor. Gay Wilentz's introduction discusses Anzia Yezierska's life and work.Originally published in 1923.

The Depression era closingof a Ford plant sends Andy and two companions to Moscow to find work ina Soviet automotive plant, where he meets Natasha, an exemplar of the"new Soviet woman." Based on Myra Page's own experiences in Moscow duringthe first Five-Year Plan, Natasha is a portrait of women's contradictorysocial position in the early periods of socialist construction. At thecore of this novel is a firsthand look at the developing forces and changingrelations of production forces that bring about the conversion of Andyinto a "Moscow Yankee." While revealing the political and economic policiesthat would inevitably lead to the demise of Soviet-style socialism, Moscow Yankee refutes the notion that egalitarian societies cannot succeedbecause they fail to take into account the individualism and greed of"human nature." Barbara Foley's introduction analyzes the Soviet Socialistconstruction in Page's novel and the politics of the novelistic form inrelation to Moscow Yankee.Originally published in 1935"A picture of Americans luredto Moscow by hope in the 'great experiment,' and of others driven thereby the depression, and of still others attracted by the simple desireto get good engineering jobs, Moscow Yankee; has a decidedvalue . . . a sense of life, stirring in the chaos of destruction andreconstruction." -- The New York Times Book Review

A story of the growth of thenew South, To Make My Bread revolves around a family of Appalachianmountaineers—small farmers, hunters, and moonshiners—drivenby economic conditions to the milltown and transformed into millhands,strikers, and rebels against the established order. Recognized as oneof the major works on the Gastonia textile strike, Grace Lumpkin's novelis also important for anyone interested in cultural or feminist historyas it deals with early generations of women radicals committed to addressingthe difficult connections of class and race. Suzanne Sowinska's introductionlooks at Lumpkin's volatile career and this book's critical reception.Originally published in 1932"[The book's] meaningrises out of people in dramatic conflict with other people and with theconditions of their life. . . . [Lumpkin] treats her theme with a craftsman'sand a psychologist's respect. The novel springs naturally from its author'simmersion in and personal knowledge of her absorbing subject material."-- The New York Times"Unpretentious . . .written in a simple and matter-of-fact prose, and yet reading it has beena more real, more satisfying experience than that which almost any otherrecent work of fiction has given me. I cannot imagine how anyone couldread it and not be moved by it." -- The Nation"A beautiful and sincerenovel, outstanding." -- The New RepublicThe late

One of the best novels ever to portray the lives of American Communist activists, The Great Midland is a story of love and radical politics set just before World War II. It was published in 1948, when cold-war hysteria engulfed the United States; the publisher subsequently tried to pretend the book did not exist, and review media and bookstores ignored it.The book vividly depicts the multiracial and multiethnic alliances that developed as Chicago railroad workers struggled to organize. It presents some of its narrative through the complex consciousness of Stephanie Koviak, a young, first-generation Polish-American.

Originally published in 1953, Burning Valley tells the story of Benedict Bulmanis, son of a Lithuanian immigrant steel worker in western Pennsylvania. Determined to become a priest, Benedict faces inner conflict as he witnesses the steelworkers' struggle against the destruction of their homes and the separation of classes that even his church cannot escape. As the story unfolds, Benedict loses his faith in God but acquires a new faith, in the power of the working class and the justice of their cause. Alan Wald's introduction focuses on the semi-autobiographical aspect of the book as well as its "multifaceted dramatization of ethnicity and race."

Five men and a woman, all African Americans, huddle in the rattling darkness of a boxcar headed north, away from a brutal South, seeking freedom and opportunity. They are joined by a white intruder whose own quest puts them all in great danger. Like Chaucer's pilgrims in The Canterbury Tales, each of these travelers has a story to tell, and these stories-of humor and humiliation, of prostitution and pride, of love and murder-unfold in the course of the journey. They reveal the lives and secrets of the tellers and give this transient community self-respect and solidarity as it hurtles toward arrest or worse.The Big Boxcar, written from a totally black perspective by a white author, bears witness to the structural racism of a social order that sets ordinary people of different colors against each other to the disadvantage of all. Alan Wald's introduction documents Maund's life of activism and his uncompromising commitment to social emancipation.

Abraham Polonsky is perhaps best known for his film work: director of the motion picture Force of Evil, for which he wrote the screen play with Ira Wolfert from Wolfert's novel Tucker's People, and screenwriter for Academy Award nominee Body and Soul. The World Above, his third and most celebrated novel, was originally published the year before Polonsky was blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee. This brilliantly original novel follows psychologist Carl Myers as he progresses from a purely objective interest in scientific problems to a profound concern with the human implications of those problems. As he becomes disenchanted with friends and colleagues, the pull of class and family loyalties, first toward his union-organizer brother and then toward his brother's widow, offers him another way to see the world and to live in it.A sweeping historical novel rich in psychological insights, The World Above reveals the legacy of the 1930s for the war years and the McCarthy era. At the same time it explores the personal impact of hard political reality with which Polonsky himself has been so well acquainted.