Nancy Stout: One Day in December: Celia Sánchez and the Cuban Revolution (2013)
Filed under book | Tags: · biography, cuba, politics, revolution
Celia Sánchez is the missing actor of the Cuban Revolution. Although not as well known in the English-speaking world as Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, Sánchez played a pivotal role in launching the revolution and administering the revolutionary state. She joined the clandestine 26th of July Movement and went on to choose the landing site of the Granma and fight with the rebels in the Sierra Maestra. She collected the documents that would form the official archives of the revolution, and, after its victory, launched numerous projects that enriched the lives of many Cubans, from parks to literacy programs to helping develop the Cohiba cigar brand. All the while, she maintained a close relationship with Fidel Castro that lasted until her death in 1980.
The product of ten years of original research, this biography draws on interviews with Sánchez’s friends, family, and comrades in the rebel army, along with countless letters and documents. Biographer Nancy Stout was initially barred from the official archives, but, in a remarkable twist, was granted access by Fidel Castro himself, impressed as he was with Stout’s project and aware that Sánchez deserved a worthy biography. This is the extraordinary story of an extraordinary woman who exemplified the very best values of the Cuban Revolution: selfless dedication to the people, courage in the face of grave danger, and the desire to transform society.
With a Foreword by Alice Walker
Publisher Monthly Review Press, 2013
ISBN 1583673172, 9781583673171
400 pages
PDF (MOBI)
PDF (alt link, MOBI)
PDF (EPUB, added on 2013-6-5)
Andrew Hsiao, Audrea Lim (eds.): The Verso Book of Dissent: From Spartacus to the Shoe-Thrower of Baghdad (2010)
Filed under book | Tags: · activism, dissent, philosophy, politics, protest, resistance, revolution, social movements
A sparkling anthology of revolt and resistance to orthodoxy and repression.
Throughout the ages and across every continent, people have struggled against those in power and raised their voices in protest—rallying others around them and inspiring uprisings in eras yet to come. Their echoes reverberate from Ancient Greece, China and Egypt, via the dissident poets and philosophers of Islam and Judaism, through to the Arab slave revolts and anti-Ottoman rebellions of the Middle Ages. These sources were tapped during the Dutch and English revolutions at the outset of the Modern world, and in turn flowed into the French, Haitian, American, Russian and Chinese revolutions. More recently, resistance to war and economic oppression has flared up on battlefields and in public spaces from Beijing and Baghdad to Caracas and Los Angeles.
This anthology, global in scope, presents voices of dissent from every era of human history: speeches and pamphlets, poems and songs, plays and manifestos. Every age has its iconoclasts, and yet the greatest among them build on the words and actions of their forerunners. The Verso Book of Dissent will become an invaluable resource, reminding today’s citizens that these traditions will never die.
Preface by Tariq Ali
Publisher Verso Books, 2010
ISBN 1844674487, 9781844674480
366 pages
PDF (updated on 2013-5-2)
Comment (0)Hamid Dabashi: The Arab Spring: The End of Postcolonialism (2012)
Filed under book | Tags: · arab spring, egypt, geopolitics, iran, islam, libya, marxism, middle east, politics, postcolonialism, revolution, theory
This pioneering explanation of the Arab Spring will define a new era of thinking about the Middle East.
In this landmark book, Hamid Dabashi argues that the revolutionary uprisings that have engulfed multiple countries and political climes from Morocco to Iran and from Syria to Yemen, were driven by a ‘Delayed Defiance’ – a point of rebellion against domestic tyranny and globalized disempowerment alike – that signifies no less than the end of postcolonialism. Sketching a new geography of liberation, Dabashi shows how the Arab Spring has altered the geopolitics of the region so radically that we must begin re-imagining the ‘the Middle East’.
Ultimately, the ‘permanent revolutionary mood’ Dabashi brilliantly explains has the potential to liberate not only those societies already ignited, but many others through a universal geopolitics of hope.
Publisher Zed Books, 2012
ISBN 1780322232, 9781780322230
150 pages
review (Jack Farmer, Socialist Review)
interview with the author (JP O’Malley, OpenDemocracy)