Perseus Academic: Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist by Alexander Berkman

What lessons there are in this book! Like all truthful documents it makes us love and hate our fellow men, doubt ourselves, doubt our society… . It tends to complicate the present simplicity of our moral attitudes. It tends to make us more mature. — Hutchins Hapgood

[Berkman's] prison memoirs are fantastic… . They are absolutely extraordinary. — Kay Boyle

No other book discusses so frankly the criminal ways of closed prison society. — Kenneth Rexroth

After his attempted assassination of Henry Clay Frick — the architect of the Homestead Steel massacre — in 1892, Alexander Berkman was sentenced to twenty-two years in Western Penitentiary of Pennsylvania. The result was what has become a classic political memoir. Originally published in 1912 by Emma Goldman's Mother Earth Press, this is the first completely annotated edition of a book known for its keen insights into both the motivations behind extremist acts and the oppressive features of prison life. It is also the moving story of one man's ethical and political education, his humanizing evolution from young revolutionary ideologue with little time for common criminals to sympathetic comrade of his fellow inmates.

Alexander Berkman was a leading writer and participant in the twentieth-century anarchist movement. Deported from New York City to his native Russia in 1919, he saw first hand the failure of the Bolshevik revolution, and wrote The Russian Tragedy and What Is Anarchism?

Barry Pateman is the curator of the Emma Goldman Papers at the University of California Berkeley and is the editor of Chomsky on Anarchism and The Blast.

Alexander Berkman: Alexander Berkman was a leading writer and participant in the 20th century Anarchist movement. The young, idealistic Berkman practiced propaganda by deed attempting to assassinate Henry Clay Frick during the Homestead Steel Strike of 1892. While imprisoned, he wrote the classic tale of prison life Prison Memoirs of and Anarchist. After his release, Berkman edited Emma Goldman's Mother Earth and his own paper The Blast!. Deported from New York City to his native Russia in 1919, were he saw first hand the failure of the Bolshevik revolution and dedicated himself to writing the classic primer on Anarchism, What is Anarchism?.

Barry Pateman: Barry Pateman is the curator of the Emma Goldman Archive at the University of California Berkeley and wrote the introduction to AK Press' Chomsky on Anarchism.