Emma Goldman: The Life and Legacy of the Famous Feminist Icon

By: Charles River Editors

Narrated by: Scott Clem

• Includes Goldman's own quotes about her life and work

"To the daring belongs the future...when we run out of dreams, we die."

"The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the Black man's right to his body, or woman's right to her soul." (Emma Goldman)

In the early 20th century, one of the most famous women in America was Emma Goldman, but plenty of people thought it was for all the wrong reasons. Born in Russia in the late 19th century, Goldman had come to the United States as a teen and quickly grew attracted to anarchy and socialism over what she viewed as unfair class structures in her new home, especially in the wake of the Haymarket riots. But while many simply grumbled about the Gilded Age in private or denounced it in print, Goldman was a woman of action, from being involved in the attempted assassination of tycoon Henry Clay Frick to publishing anarchist journals and passing around information about contraception.

Although Goldman was jailed on several occasions during the first two decades of the 20th century, it was not until World War I that federal authorities reached their limit when she called upon others to resist the newly implemented draft in 1917. Deported back to Russia, Goldman had a front row seat for the Bolshevik Revolution, but she quickly grew disillusioned by Lenin's government as well, and the following decade saw her in Spain during the Spanish Civil War.

By the time Goldman died in 1940 at the age of 70, she had touched upon so many political, social, and gender issues that future generations would come to view her as a forerunner of the feminist movement. Her work ran against the grain on everything from religion to freedom of speech, with what were then radical takes on subjects like marriage, free love, homosexuality, and women's rights.

Emma Goldman: The Life and Legacy of the Famous Feminist Icon looks at the life of one of the 20th century's most famous anarchists. You will learn about Emma Goldman like never before, in no time at all.

©2015 Charles River Editors (P)2017 Charles River Editors