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Summary
Summary
Howard Zinn's views on social movements, freedom, history, democracy and our own human potential are educational and transformative. In few places is his voice more clear and accessible than in the dozens of articles he penned for The Progressive magazine from 1980 to 2009, offered together here in book form for the first time.
Whether encouraging people to organize, critiquing the government or speaking on behalf of working people who struggle to survive in an economy rigged to benefit the rich and powerful, Zinn's historical clarity, unflappable optimism and unshakable questions reverberate throughout The Historic Unfulfilled Promise: "Have our political leaders gone mad?" "What kind of country do we want to live in?" "Has the will of the people been followed?" The Historic Unfulfilled Promise is a genuine work of conscience, rich in ideas, charged with energy; an invaluable introduction for the uninitiated and a must-have for Zinn's fans.
"Passionate, iconoclastic, and wrly humorous . . . [Zinn] sometimes proves astounding in his almost clairvoyant analysis."--Publisher's Weekly Starred Review
"A sharp and insightful collection from one of the country's most visible historians and critics."--Booklist
"A useful introduction to one of America's great scholar-activists."--Kirkus Reviews
"Howard Zinn's life and work are an unforgettable model, sure to leave a permanent stamp on how history is understood and how a decent and honorable life should be lived."--Noam Chomsky
"Proudly, unabashedly radical . . . Mr. Zinn delighted in debating ideological foes, not the least his own college president, and in lancing what he considered platitudes, not the least that American history was a heroic march toward democracy."--New York Times
"For Howard, democracy was one big public fight and everyone should plunge into it. That's the only way, he said, for everyday folks to get justic--by fighting for it."--Bill Moyers
Author Notes
A committed radical historian and activist, Howard Zinn approaches the study of the past from the point of view of those whom he feels have been exploited by the powerful.
Zinn was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1922. After working in local shipyards during his teens, he joined the U.S. Army Air Force, where he saw combat as a bombardier in World War II. He received a Ph.D. in history from Columbia University in 1958 and was a postdoctoral fellow in East Asian studies at Harvard University.
While teaching at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, Zinn joined the civil rights movement and wrote The Southern Mystique (1964) and SNCC: The New Abolitionists (1964). He also became an outspoken critic of the Vietnam War, writing Vietnam: The Logic of Withdrawal (1967) and visiting Hanoi to receive the first American prisoners released by the North Vietnamese.
Zinn's best-known and most-praised work, as well as his most controversial, is A People's History of the United States (1980). It explores American history under the thesis that most historians have favored those in power, leaving another story untold. Zinn discusses such topics as Native American views of Columbus and the socialist and anarchist opposition to World War I in examining his theory that historical change is most often due to "mass movements of ordinary people."
Zinn's other books include You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train: A Personal History of Our Times (1995) and Artists in Times of War (2004). He has also written the plays Emma (1976), Daughter of Venus (1985), and Marx in Soho (1999).
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
This posthumous collection of Zinn's passionate, iconoclastic, and wryly humorous articles from the Progressive magazine spans 30 years-from 1980 to 2010-though most are of 21st-century vintage. Zinn argues repeatedly for an alternative to war, totalitarianism, and redistribution of resources and energy away from the military and "toward ideals of egalitarianism, community, and self-determination... which have been the historic, unfulfilled promise of the word democracy." Zinn (A People's History of the United States) persists with his optimism and sometimes proves astounding in his almost clairvoyant analysis, as the essays progress from Boston University student and faculty protests against the Vietnam War and the academic "Establishment" through the two Iraq wars, to Obama's expansion of the war in Afghanistan. In addition, Zinn writes of his own youth and radicalization, and his admiration for artists who "wage the battle of justice in a sphere which is unreachable by the dullness of ordinary political discourse," including a warm and perceptive memorial to Kurt Vonnegut, with whom he became friends late in life, and with whom he shared a conversion to pacifism after serving in WWII. His call to action will strike a chord with a younger generation of occupiers. Agent: The Ward & Balkin Agency. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
A collection of essays by American Left icon Zinn (The Bomb, 2010, etc.) originally published in the political journal The Progressive. "What kind of country do we want to live in?" asks the author in these essays dating mostly from the last years of his life, and thus following the historic arc from 9/11 to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the election of Obama. As always, he responds to this question with a radical's zeal, a historian's insights and an activist's optimism. War is on his mind. As the "war on terror" commenced, he railed against what he perceived to be the assault on American liberties this war had allowed. As the invasion of Iraq loomed, he warned against the countless lives that would be lost or ruined. As victory was declared in Iraq, Zinn was there to point out the horror of destroyed innocent lives and the chaos left behind. But the larger issue was war itself: "The abolition of war has become not only desirable but absolutely necessary if the planet is to be saved. It is an idea whose time has come." On the whole, this is not Zinn at his best, as these are, after all, polemical articles meant perhaps more to arouse the converted rather than enlighten the uninitiated. There is also a certain degree of repetition of themes and phrases, as will happen with any collection of articles not originally meant to be read together. Certainly, many readers will not appreciate his message, but the spirit and passion of the messenger, an American original, cannot be denied. A useful introduction to one of America's great scholar-activists.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Historian and social activist Zinn, who died in 2010, was known for his often controversial views on politics, civil rights, and history. These essays, originally published in the Progressive, were written between 1980 and 2010 and spotlight his plain-speaking writing and keen analytic eye. Readers familiar with Zinn's writings, especially his widely read A People's History of the United States (1980), will note his usual unflinching approach to his subject matter and his apparent lack of regard for potential criticisms of his ideas. Similarly, both Zinn's critics and his fans (there are many of both) will not see any appreciable watering-down of his often contentious views on democracy and war, the two subjects most abundantly represented here. But here there is also an opportunity to see a side of Zinn that was often kept private. His 2007 essay, Remembering Kurt Vonnegut, for example, eulogizes the acclaimed novelist with a rather touching personal statement of Zinn's own affection for him. A sharp and insightful collection from one of the country's most visible historians and critics.--Pitt, David Copyright 2010 Booklist
Table of Contents
| Introduction | p. 7 |
| 1 To Disagree Is to Be Put on the Enemies List | p. 13 |
| 2 A Murderous Word | p. 29 |
| 3 Organizing the Organized | p. 33 |
| 4 Outside the Classroom: Interview with David Barsamian | p. 31 |
| 5 One Iraqi's Story | p. 53 |
| 6 A Diplomatic Solution | p. 51 |
| 7 Their Atrocities-and Ours | p. 61 |
| 8 Delusion 2000: How the Candidates "View the World | p. 69 |
| 9 One Radical Who Did It All | p. 15 |
| 10 Artists of Resistance | p. 79 |
| 11 Operation Enduring War | p. 87 |
| 12 What War Looks Like | p. 93 |
| 13 Our Job Is a Simple One: Stop Them | p. 99 |
| 14 A Chorus against War | p. 103 |
| 15 Dying for the Government | p. 111 |
| 16 Humpty Dumpty Will Fall | p. 115 |
| 17 An Occupied Country | p. 121 |
| 18 The Logic of Withdrawal | p. 129 |
| 19 Opposing the War Party | p. 139 |
| 20 What Do We Do Now? | p. 147 |
| 21 Our War on Terrorism | p. 153 |
| 22 Harness That Anger | p. 159 |
| 23 Changing Minds, One at a Time | p. 165 |
| 24 After the War | p. 173 |
| 25 Why War Fails | p. 179 |
| 26 Impeachment by the People | p. 185 |
| 27 Are We Politicians or Citizens? | p. 191 |
| 28 Kurt Vonnegut Remembered | p. 197 |
| 29 Election Madness | p. 203 |
| 30 The Obama Difference | p. 209 |
| 31 The Nobel's Feeble Gesture | p. 215 |
| 32 Three Holy Wars | p. 221 |
| 33 They Rioted if Necessary | p. 229 |
| Index | p. 239 |
| About the Authors | p. 251 |
