Now and After: The ABC of Communist Anarchism - Paperback

by Alexander Berkman (Author), Emma Goldman (Preface by), Barry Pateman (Introduction by)

A compelling work to be studied and applied to new conditions each generation.

An exposition of anarchism by one of its greatest propagandists and clearest thinkers. In a conversational style, Berkman discusses society as it now exists, the need for anarchism, and the methods for bringing it about. His primary goal for writing the book was to dispel the misinformation concerning the aspirations of anarchists in the minds of average people. The secondary goal was to reexamine the movement after the Russian Revolution and to promote the fact that authoritarian methods cannot lead to liberty, indeed: methods and aims must be identical to ensure lasting equality and freedom.

Author Biography

Alexander Berkman (1870-1936) was a leading writer and participant in the twentieth-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 an Anarchist. After his release, Berkman edited Emma Goldman's Mother Earth and his own paper The Blast! When he was deported from New York City to his native Russia in 1919, and saw firsthand the failure of the Bolshevik revolution, Berkman dedicated himself to writing his now quintessential political primer, Now and After.

Emma Goldman (1869-1940) immigrated to the United States from Russia as a teenager before being deported in 1919 for her revolutionary activities. She spent her adult life writing, lecturing, and struggling on behalf of the anarchist ideal. Goldman edited Mother Earth and wrote numerous essays and books, including Living My Life and My Disillusionment in Russia.

Barry Pateman is a former Associate Editor at the Emma Goldman Papers. He is coeditor of Alexander Berkman's Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist as well as Emma Goldman's Anarchism and Other Essays and is a member of the Kate Sharpley Library Collective.