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An American Anarchist: The Life of Voltaire De Cleyre

`An American Anarchist` marked the trail historians of American anarchism are still following today: above all else, to understand anarchists as human beings. Narrative-driven like all of Paul Avrich`s works, this story highlights famous characters like Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman and the infamous, like Dyer D. Lum — Voltairine de Cleyre`s lover and the man who sneaked a dynamite cartridge into Louis Lingg`s cell so the accused Haymarket Martyr could die at his own hand and not the state`s. De Cleyre (1866-1912), born in Michigan, is noted as the first prominent American-born anarchist. From her voluminous writings and speeches, the illnesses that plagued her, the shooting on a streetcar in Philadelphia that left de Cleyre clinging for life, to her eventual death at forty-five in Chicago, she worked tirelessly for her ideal.