Joel Fishbane's Blog - Posts Tagged "biography"

Emma Goldman: An Intimate Life by Alice Wexler

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Not officially a two volume set, both Emma Goldman: An Intimate Life and Emma Goldman In Exile are well-researched biographies of the two halves of the famed anarchist's life: B.E. (Before Exile) and A.E. (I'll leave you guess what this stands for). Sent packing from the U.S. after years of anti-government rhetoric, Emma Goldman spent the last twenty years of her life yearning for what she did during the first forty. Or at least, this is the inherent implication in Ms. Wexler's books, which cut a definitive line down the middle of Emma Goldman's life. Ms. Wexler is not in love with Emma Goldman, which makes her an ideal author to conduct this study: there are no rose tinted glasses here, and both books are thoroug, sometimes critical examination of Emma, her politics and the world in which she tried to implement them.

An essential bit of Goldman scholarship, Ms. Wexler's tomes are only quasi-chronological; although events are grouped in rough accordance with a timeline. Ms. Wexler isn't afraid to deviate it from this if it suits her thematic approach. She prefers to discuss Emma's life this way, alternating between the personal and the political in order to give us the full picture of a woman once called "the most dangerous woman in America". This creates a fascinating juxtaposition, as Emma's personal life appears to have contrasted sharply with the cultivated public persona. To the world she was Emma Goldman the Anarchist, who provoked riots, advocated birth control, fought against conscription and inspired Leon Czologosz to shoot President McKinley (Czologosz himself claimed to have been inspired by Goldman's lectures). But behind the scenes she was a scarred romantic, often to the point of desperation. Just as she leapt from one cause to the next, Emma Goldman's life was dotted by a series of ill-fated affairs, each of which have their own air of near-Shakespearian tragedy.

Both books succeed in deliver the fascinating story that is Emma Goldman's life. Born in Russia during the Franco-Prussian War, she emigrated to the U.S. where she became an anarchist, suffered a failed marriage, went to jail several times and was finally deported in 1917. Returning to Bolshevik Russia, she was instantly disappointed by what she found, sending her on a twenty year odyssey to find both a new cause and a new home. There's an ache to the second half of Emma' story, which may be why I found it much more engaging then the first. There is a deeper struggle in the second half of Emma's life, an urgency that is largely absent from her earlier years. At least, this is how it is presented by Alice Wexler; whether consciously or not, even her sharp pen takes pity on Emma.

Still, these aren't perfect examinations of Emma's life. Ms. Wexler has her preference when it comes to subject - she delves deeply into Emma's politics, but speaks very little about Emma's stance on birth control. Even so, one can't deny that the subtitle to the first book - An Intimate Life - is highly appropriate. Who knew that Emma Goldman could write such dirty letters? By rummaging through Emma Goldman's mailbag, Ms. Wexler reveals a lusty mind with a sexual appetite not often attributed to women of the era. The letters to Ben Reitman - a whorehouse physician who Emma loved during the first years of the 20th century - are especially lewd, sometimes bordering on the pornographic (at least for that era). In later years, there is a clear indication of Emma trying to recapture some of this lust with her other lovers, often with limited success.

According to Ms. Wexler, then, there is something of the classic historical tragedy in Emma Goldman. A towering inspiration in her professional life (to this day there are Emma Goldman societies), she seems to have spent most of her personal life hungering for more.



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Benjamin Harrison by Charles W. Calhoun

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


The latest in my ongoing effort to study America through the lens of presidential biographies, Charles W. Calhoun's Benjamin Harrison manages the amazing act of being as informative as a Wikipedia article without actually revealing all that much about its subject. This may be a result of the scope of the book - it's part of The American President's Series, edited by Arthur M. Schlessinger Jr, and it's probable that the author was working towards a specific word count. Whatever the reason, this is hardly the most comprehensive look at the life of the 23rd President (that honor resides with the 3 volume opus by Harry J. Sievers). This isn't necessarily a bad thing; but the book succeeds in revealing very little about Benjamin Harrison himself. This is a political biography, focused entirely on Harrison's professional actions, rather then his personal life. This sadly contradicts the aim of the American President series which, according to Mr. Schlessinger is to remind us of the humanity behind America's leaders.

A book that concentrates on Harrison's personal life might prove in drumming up some interest in the man, who is largely forgotten when it comes time to discuss America's presidents. Harrison's political life was the usual domestic arguments over the tariff, pensions, patronage and the economy, with a few international disputes to give the whole thing a little spice. But there are hints of a Greek drama going on behind the scenes: Harrison struck up a long friendship with his wife's neice, Mary Scott "Mame" Dimmick, such that she was eventually brought to the White House and was so trusted that she knew the government ciphers. His many surviving letters to her speak to a deep friendship and he continually sent her invitations and confided in her his professional concerns. All this might just be an echo of the Chester Arthur - Julia Sand relationship, if not for the fact that Harrison married his Mame in 1896, four years after the death of Harrison's first wife.

Mr. Calhoun doesn't let himself delve too deeply into this relationship, although this may be because he discounts the implications that there was a long, secret affair (platonic or otherwise). The question was certainly raised by Harrison's daughter, Mary, and her husband Robert McKee. They detested Mame and Robert seems to have suggested that the relationship was at best thoroughly improper. In any case, after the marriage, Harrison became estranged from his daughter and the two rarely, if ever, spoke. Marrying your wife's necee certainly isn't illegal, but it does fall into a murky moral terrain and the various questions about what really lay at the heart of Harrison and Mame (pun intended) is by far the most intriguing thing about him.

As mentioned, Mr. Calhoun doesn't go too deeply into any of this; much of this book is a survey of Harrison's accomplishments during his single term in office. There's about as much information here as there is in Alyn Brodsky's book on Grover Cleveland, another book which tries to demonstrate a man's forgotten contributions of the man to the evolution of American politics. Brodsky was pretty convincing in his portrayals, but then his book was also larger in scope. He was much more excited about his subject and the age in which he lived; Mr. Calhoun knows a lot about Harrison, but I never got the feeling that the man had inflamed his passion. It may be that there's a book out there that proves Harrison wasn't a caretaker president - but I'm not sure this one is it.





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