Revolutionary Lives

Frantz Fanon (1925-1961) was a Caribbean and African psychiatrist, philosopher and revolutionary whose works, including “Black Skin”, “White Masks”, and “The Wretched of the Earth” are hugely influential in the fields of post-colonial studies, critical theory, and post-Marxism. His legacy remains with us today, having inspired movements in Palestine, Sri Lanka, the US and South Africa. This is a critical biography of his extraordinary life. Peter Hudis draws on the expanse of his life and work, from his upbringing in Martinique and early intellectual influences to his mature efforts to fuse psychoanalysis and philosophy and contributions to the anti-colonial struggle in Algeria, to counter the monolithic assumption that Fanon's contribution to modern thought is defined by the advocacy of violence. He was a political activist who brought his interests in psychology and philosophy directly to bear on such issues as mutual recognition, democratic participation and political sovereignty. Hudis shows that, as a result, Fanon emerges as neither armchair intellectual nor intransigent militant.

On the 27th August, 1963, the day before Martin Luther King electrified the world from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with the immortal words, 'I Have a Dream', the life of another giant of the Civil Rights movement quietly drew to a close in Accra, Ghana: W.E.B. DuBois. In this new biography, Bill V. Mullen interprets the seismic political developments of the Twentieth Century through Du Bois's revolutionary life. Du Bois was born in Massachusetts in 1868, just three years after formal emancipation of America's slaves. In his extraordinarily long and active political life, he would emerge as the first black man to earn a PhD from Harvard; surpass Booker T. Washington as the leading advocate for African American rights; co-found the NAACP, and involve himself in anti-imperialist and anti-colonial struggles across Asia and Africa. Beyond his Civil Rights work, Mullen also examines Du Bois's attitudes towards socialism, the USSR, China's Communist Revolution, and the intersectional relationship between capitalism, poverty and racism. An accessible introduction to a towering figure of American Civil Rights, perfect for anyone wanting to engage with Du Bois's life and work.