The Tragedy of Woman’s Emancipation is an autobiographical work by Emma Goldman, the noted anarchist and political activist. The book chronicles Goldman’s life from her arrival in New York City in August 1889 through the early decades of her involvement in the American anarchist movement. Written in the first person, the narrative draws extensively on Goldman’s personal correspondence, recovered letters, and her own recollections of events spanning approximately three decades.
The work opens with an appreciative preface in which Goldman explains the circumstances that led her to write her memoirs. She describes how suggestions to write her autobiography came throughout her life but that she resisted because she was living intensely and believed one should write autobiography only at a “good philosophic age,” capable of viewing life’s tragedies and comedies impersonally and detachedly. Forced European inactivity led her to read biographies and autobiographies, where she discovered that old age often brings “senility, narrowness, and petty rancor” rather than wisdom, prompting serious consideration of writing her life.
Goldman details the practical difficulties of composing her memoirs, particularly the loss of historical materials. Books, correspondence, and documents accumulated during thirty-five years in the United States had been confiscated by Department of Justice raiders and never returned, including her personal set of Mother Earth magazine, which she had published for twelve years. Friends came to her aid, including Leonard D. Abbott, Agnes Inglis (founder of the Labadie Library in Detroit), and W. S. Van Valkenburgh, who conducted research. For European data she relied on Max Nettlau and Rudolf Rocker. Her habit of writing letters—often chided by her “pal Sasha” (Alexander Berkman)—provided “veritable mountains” of correspondence. Over one thousand letters were recovered.
The book was written in Saint-Tropez, France, with the assistance of secretaries including Emily Holmes Coleman and later Miriam Lerner. Alexander Berkman helped revise the manuscript for eighteen months and suggested the title Living My Life. The work is dedicated as tribute and gratitude to all who came into Goldman’s life.
The narrative is set primarily in the United States, with significant portions devoted to Goldman’s experiences in New York City, particularly the Lower East Side, as well as her travels for lecturing tours across the country. The book also covers her time in European cities including London, Vienna, and Paris, and her imprisonment in American penitentiaries. The period covered extends from the late 1880s through the first decade of the twentieth century, encompassing major events in American labor history, the anarchist movement, and Goldman’s personal development.
Context
The book emerges from the milieu of late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century American radicalism. Goldman arrived in New York City in 1889, a period marked by intense labor struggles, the aftermath of the Haymarket affair, and the growth of anarchist and socialist movements among immigrant communities. The execution of the Chicago anarchists in November 1887—Albert Parsons, August Spies, Adolph Fischer, George Engel, and Louis Lingg—serves as a touchstone throughout the narrative, shaping Goldman’s political consciousness and that of her comrades.
The work reflects the tensions within the anarchist movement between different factions and approaches. Goldman’s involvement with Johann Most and the German-language anarchist paper Freiheit places her within a particular tradition of revolutionary anarchism, while her relationships with figures like Alexander Berkman, Voltairine de Cleyre, and others illustrate the diverse currents within the movement. The book also documents the emergence of a native-born American anarchist movement alongside the immigrant-based organizations.
The historical context includes major labor events such as the Homestead steel strike of 1892, the cloakmakers’ strikes in New York, and the free-silver campaign of William Jennings Bryan. Goldman’s narrative also touches on international events, including the Paris International Socialist Congress of 1889, the Russian Revolution of 1905, and various European anarchist activities. The Spanish-American War and its aftermath, the anti-anarchist immigration law, and the McNamara case in Los Angeles all appear in the narrative as significant historical moments.
Goldman’s personal context includes her Jewish immigrant background, her arrival in America from Russia via Germany, her early factory work in Rochester and St. Petersburg, and her gradual immersion in radical politics. The book documents her evolution from a young immigrant worker to a prominent public speaker and organizer, as well as her personal relationships and their intersection with her political commitments.
Structure of the Book
The book is organized chronologically, following Goldman’s life from her arrival in New York City in August 1889 through the events of the early 1910s. The narrative is divided into chapters that correspond to distinct periods or episodes in her life, each beginning with a striking opening statement that sets the scene for the events to follow.
The opening chapter establishes Goldman’s arrival in New York City on August 15, 1889, at age twenty, traveling from Rochester with five dollars, a small hand-bag, and a sewing-machine. This chapter introduces key figures who would shape her life, including Alexander Berkman and Johann Most, and recounts her first exposure to the radical circles of the Lower East Side. The chapter also includes flashbacks to the Haymarket affair and its aftermath, establishing the historical and emotional context for Goldman’s political awakening.
Subsequent chapters trace Goldman’s early years in New York, including her factory work, her developing relationship with Berkman, and her first public speaking engagements. The narrative moves through the cloakmakers’ strike, her growing involvement in the anarchist movement, and the beginning of her romantic relationship with Ed Brady. A significant portion of the book is devoted to Berkman’s imprisonment following his attempt on the life of Henry Clay Frick during the Homestead strike, and Goldman’s own imprisonment on Blackwell’s Island.
The middle sections of the book cover Goldman’s activities in the mid-1890s, including her work with the anarchist movement in various American cities, her encounters with figures like John Turner and other British anarchists, and her trip to Europe for nursing training in Vienna. The narrative describes her return to America and her increasing prominence as a lecturer and organizer.
Later chapters document the renaissance in anarchist ranks, the growth of English-language anarchist publications, and Goldman’s extensive lecturing tours across the United States. The book covers the Spanish-American War period, Goldman’s activities in California, and her involvement with the Russian Revolution of 1905. The final chapters deal with the anti-anarchist immigration law, the McNamara case in Los Angeles, and the increasing suppression of anarchist activities in America.
The book concludes with events surrounding the McNamara drama staged in the courts of Los Angeles, which held the entire country’s attention. The narrative ends at this point in Goldman’s life, with the reader left at a moment of national crisis and personal and political uncertainty.
Main Arguments
The book presents several interconnected arguments about politics, society, and personal liberation. Central to Goldman’s account is the claim that the State serves as an instrument of oppression that crushes working people to sustain the ruling class. In her Union Square speech, she declares the State “their worst enemy, a machine crushing them to sustain the ruling class,” and attacks labor politicians who appeal to the legislature only to meet evasions. She argues that political freedom in countries like England serves as a “safety-valve against the fearful destitution,” allowing subjects to “let off steam in unhampered talk” to prevent rebellion.
Goldman argues against reformist politics, including the eight-hour workday struggle and the free-silver campaign. Following Johann Most’s teaching, she contends that even successful reform campaigns distract from the real issue—struggle against capitalism and the wage system. She refuses to join the free-silver campaign despite pressure from comrades, sensing that Bryan was “weak, superficial, aiming at White House rather than freeing people” and believing that Bryan would use workers as stepping-stone to power.
The book argues for the necessity of individual acts of resistance and revolution, while also acknowledging the costs and consequences of such acts. Goldman reflects on Sasha and others “driven by social forces to do the very thing they abhorred most, to destroy human life,” and rebels against such waste while recognizing that organized violence “inevitably begets more violence.” She insists, however, that “no sacrifice is lost for a great ideal.”
A significant argument concerns women’s emancipation and the limitations of conventional understandings of freedom. Goldman’s title essay—referenced in the book’s title—argues that women’s emancipation as commonly understood is tragic because it offers only a narrow, superficial freedom that does not address deeper questions of personal fulfillment and social transformation. Through her own experiences, she demonstrates the tensions between personal relationships and political commitment, between motherhood and activism, and between conventional morality and authentic self-expression.
Goldman argues for the right to self-expression and the rejection of conventions that demand the denial of life and joy. When criticized for dancing with reckless abandon at a strike dance, she insists that a Cause standing for anarchism, release, and freedom from conventions should not demand denial of life and joy. She declares she will not become a nun and that the movement should not become a cloister: “I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody’s right to beautiful, radiant things.”
The book also argues against religious hypocrisy and for atheism. When imprisoned, Goldman refuses to attend church services, declaring her disbelief and refusal to be a hypocrite. She documents the cruelty and hypocrisy of religious authorities, from her childhood teachers to prison officials.
Key Concepts
The Cause: Throughout the book, “the Cause” refers to the anarchist movement and its goals of revolutionary transformation. Goldman and her comrades subordinate personal desires and material comforts to the Cause. Berkman declares that as an anarchist he cannot consider his own job—only the Cause matters. The Russian revolutionary catechism, which Berkman cites, demands that revolutionists give up home, parents, sweetheart, children. Goldman struggles with the tension between personal life and devotion to the Cause, recognizing she is “woven of many skeins,” torn between yearning for personal life and giving all to her ideal.
Attentat: The concept of the attentat—an act of individual violence against a tyrant or oppressor—appears throughout the book. Berkman’s attempt on Frick’s life during the Homestead strike is the central example. Goldman reflects on the futility and necessity of such acts, questioning whether Berkman’s sacrifice was in vain while insisting that no sacrifice is lost for a great ideal. The book also discusses French attentats by Émile Henri, Auguste Vaillant, and Santa Caserio, and their consequences.
The Chicago Martyrs: The Haymarket martyrs—Parsons, Spies, Fischer, Engel, Lingg, Schwab, Fielden, and Neebe—serve as guiding spirits throughout the narrative. Goldman describes the trial as “the worst frame-up in the history of the United States,” with the District Attorney declaring “anarchy was on trial.” Lingg, who committed suicide rather than face execution, becomes “the beacon of our lives” for Goldman and her comrades.
Free Love: The concept of free love appears in the context of Goldman’s personal relationships and her defense of women’s autonomy. She rejects the idea that women should be possessions of men, and when a married man approaches her claiming to believe in free love while seeking a clandestine affair, she reflects on how lofty ideals can be perverted by those who remain “as sterile as the Sahara.”
The Nihilists: Goldman’s childhood understanding of Russian Nihilists evolves from seeing them as “black, sinister creatures” to recognizing them as heroes and martyrs who “could not witness suffering without protest and sacrificed their lives.” Her uncle’s involvement with Nihilists, the story of Vera Zassulich, and her reading of Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons and Chernishevsky’s What’s to be Done? shape her political development.
The “Bohemian Republic”: Goldman’s flat in the “Bohemian Republic” becomes a gathering place for radicals and a “temple of love” during her relationship with Ed. The concept represents the alternative community and way of living that anarchists create outside conventional society.
Prison Experience: Goldman’s imprisonment on Blackwell’s Island provides a sustained meditation on the nature of incarceration and its effects on prisoners. She describes the nightly locking of cells, the daily lock-step march carrying buckets of excrement, and the despair that possesses prisoners. Her three weeks in the Tombs proved to her that crime results from poverty, as most defendants were from the lowest strata.
The “Social Dung-Heap”: Goldman uses this phrase to describe the prisoners she nurses in the penitentiary sick-ward, who are “derelicts on the ‘social dung-heap.'” The concept reflects her analysis of how society discards its most vulnerable members.
Themes
The Tragedy of Woman’s Emancipation: The book’s title essay—and its themes—address the limitations of conventional women’s emancipation. Goldman argues that women’s freedom as commonly understood—the right to work, vote, and participate in public life—does not address deeper questions of personal fulfillment, sexual autonomy, and authentic self-expression. Through her own experiences, she explores the tensions between motherhood and activism, between love and independence, and between conventional respectability and radical commitment. Her relationship with Ed reveals the persistence of traditional attitudes even among progressive men; when Ed declares that “Nature has made her for motherhood. All else is nonsense, artificial and unreal,” Goldman identifies his attitude as “the man’s instinct of possession.”
The Conflict Between Personal Life and Political Commitment: Throughout the book, Goldman struggles to reconcile her desires for love, companionship, and personal happiness with her devotion to the Cause. Her relationships with Berkman, Fedya, and Ed all founder on this tension. She recognizes that she is “woven of many skeins,” torn between yearning for personal life and giving all to her ideal. The book explores whether it is possible to live a full personal life while committed to revolutionary politics.
Immigrant Experience and Alienation: Goldman’s narrative is deeply shaped by her experience as an immigrant. Her arrival in New York with five dollars and a sewing-machine, her early factory work, and her navigation of multiple languages and cultures all reflect the immigrant experience. The book also documents the diversity of the anarchist movement, which drew on German, Jewish, Italian, Spanish, and native-born American radicals.
The Meaning of Freedom: The book repeatedly interrogates what freedom actually means. Political freedom in England, Goldman argues, is a “safety-valve” that prevents rebellion. The freedom offered by American democracy is exposed as hollow when workers are exploited and radicals are imprisoned. True freedom, the book suggests, requires economic justice and the transformation of social relations, not merely formal political rights.
Violence and Its Costs: The book grapples with the question of revolutionary violence. Berkman’s attentat on Frick, the French attentats, and the state’s violent repression of radicals all raise questions about the efficacy and morality of violence. Goldman reflects that organized violence “inevitably begets more violence” while also recognizing the desperation that drives individuals to such acts.
The Power of Ideas and Culture: The book emphasizes the importance of intellectual and cultural life in sustaining radical movements. Goldman’s reading of Chernishevsky, Turgenev, and Gontcharov; her engagement with poetry and music; and her appreciation of figures like William Morris and Peter Kropotkin all demonstrate the role of culture in political awakening. The gatherings at the Netter home, with their samovar and zakusky, represent the intellectual and cultural life that sustained the movement.
Hypocrisy and Moral Corruption: The book repeatedly exposes hypocrisy, both within the radical movement and in society at large. The Reitzel “friends” who claim to be anarchists while holding elitist and exploitative views, the religious teachers who abuse children, and the prison officials who discriminate against non-Anglo-Saxons all illustrate the gap between professed ideals and actual behavior.
The Body and Health: Goldman’s narrative pays close attention to bodily experience—illness, pain, exhaustion, and recovery. Her childhood crossing of the frozen brook between Germany and Russia leaves her with lasting physical suffering. Her imprisonment causes rheumatism. Her work as a nurse in the penitentiary sick-ward and her later nursing training in Vienna reflect her engagement with questions of health and care.
The Author’s Conclusions
The book concludes at a moment of crisis and uncertainty. The final chapters describe the McNamara drama staged in the courts of Los Angeles, which held the entire country’s attention. This event, along with the anti-anarchist immigration law smuggled through Congress and the increasing suppression of anarchist activities, marks a period of intensified repression against the movement Goldman had devoted her life to.
Throughout the narrative, Goldman draws several conclusions from her experiences. She concludes that the State is fundamentally an instrument of oppression, regardless of its form. Political freedom without economic justice is a sham, a “safety-valve” that allows the oppressed to talk while remaining in misery. She concludes that reformist politics cannot achieve fundamental change, and that even well-intentioned campaigns like the eight-hour workday struggle or the free-silver movement ultimately serve to maintain the existing system.
Goldman also concludes that personal liberation is inseparable from political liberation. The tragedy of woman’s emancipation, as she frames it, is that women have been offered a narrow form of freedom that does not address their deeper needs for self-expression, sexual autonomy, and meaningful work. Her own refusal to choose between personal life and political commitment—despite the difficulties this creates—represents her conviction that both are necessary.
The book suggests that sacrifice for ideals is meaningful even when it appears futile. Despite her doubts about whether Berkman’s attentat was in vain, Goldman insists that “no sacrifice is lost for a great ideal.” The memory of the Chicago martyrs, the example of the Russian Nihilists, and the ongoing work of anarchists in America and Europe all demonstrate the persistence of the revolutionary spirit.
Goldman’s conclusions about human nature are tempered by her experiences. She documents both the capacity for sympathy and devotion among the most oppressed—the prisoners who befriend her despite her reputation as an atheist anarchist—and the corruption and hypocrisy that pervade institutions and individuals. Her encounters with men who claim to believe in free love while seeking clandestine affairs, and with radicals who hold elitist views, lead her to reflect on the “futility of lofty ideals” when hearts and heads remain “as sterile as the Sahara.”
The book ends without resolution, at a moment when the movement Goldman helped build faces unprecedented repression. The final events—the McNamara case, the anti-anarchist laws, the suppression of meetings—suggest that the struggle will continue under increasingly difficult conditions. Goldman’s narrative, which began with her arrival in New York as a young immigrant with five dollars and a sewing-machine, concludes with her as a seasoned revolutionary facing an uncertain future, still committed to the ideals that have guided her life.
Significance
The book stands as a major document of American radicalism and women’s history. It provides a detailed first-hand account of the anarchist movement in the United States from the late 1880s through the early 1910s, documenting the personalities, debates, and activities that shaped the movement. Goldman’s narrative offers insight into the immigrant communities that sustained radical politics, the labor struggles of the period, and the state’s response to revolutionary activity.
The work is significant for its sustained exploration of the relationship between personal life and political commitment. Goldman’s candid account of her relationships with Berkman, Fedya, and Ed, and her struggles to reconcile love and activism, offers a rare perspective on the gendered dimensions of revolutionary politics. Her analysis of the “tragedy of woman’s emancipation” anticipates later feminist critiques of liberal feminism’s limitations.
The book also contributes to the history of political imprisonment and state repression. Goldman’s account of her time on Blackwell’s Island provides a detailed picture of prison conditions and the treatment of political prisoners. Her documentation of the confiscation of radical materials by Department of Justice raiders, the anti-anarchist immigration law, and the suppression of meetings illustrates the state’s efforts to criminalize dissent.
As a work of autobiography, the book is notable for its frankness and self-reflection. Goldman acknowledges her doubts, failures, and contradictions, presenting herself not as a heroic figure but as a complex human being struggling to live according to her ideals. Her account of writing the book—the loss of her materials, the assistance of friends, the difficulty of reliving painful memories—adds another layer to the narrative.
The book’s significance also lies in its documentation of transnational radical networks. Goldman’s movements between America and Europe, her encounters with figures like Kropotkin, Louise Michel, and Malatesta, and her engagement with radical movements in multiple countries illustrate the international character of anarchism in this period.
Finally, the book is significant as a woman’s account of public life and political activism at a time when women’s participation in such spheres was limited. Goldman’s rise from factory worker to prominent public speaker and organizer, despite imprisonment, harassment, and persecution, offers an inspiring example of women’s agency and determination. Her insistence on the right to self-expression and her refusal to subordinate her personal life entirely to political demands represent a distinctive position within the radical movements of her time.
Detailed Section-by-Section Summary
In Appreciation: The Genesis of the Memoir
Goldman explains that she resisted suggestions to write her memoirs for years, believing that autobiography should only be attempted at a “good philosophic age,” when one could view life’s tragedies and comedies with detachment. Despite her advancing years, she felt too young and too intensely engaged in living to undertake such a task. It was only during a period of forced inactivity in Europe, when she read the autobiographies of others and found them marred by “senility, narrowness, and petty rancor,” that she began to seriously consider writing her own life story.
Her greatest obstacle was the lack of historical data. Thirty-five years of books, correspondence, and materials in the United States, including her personal set of Mother Earth magazine, had been confiscated by Department of Justice raiders and never returned. Friends came to her aid: Leonard D. Abbott, Agnes Inglis of the Labadie Library, and W. S. Van Valkenburgh conducted research, while Max Nettlau and Rudolf Rocker provided European data. To recreate the atmosphere of her personal life, she relied on her own habit of letter-writing, which had produced “veritable mountains” of correspondence. Friends like Ben Reitman, Ben Capes, Jacob Margolis, Agnes Inglis, Harry Weinberger, Van, and Leon Bass returned her letters, and her niece Stella Ballantine preserved everything from her imprisonment. Over one thousand letters were recovered.
She went to Saint-Tropez, France, with Emily Holmes Coleman (“Demi”) as her secretary—a “wild wood-sprite with a volcanic temper” who was a natural rebel and anarchist despite being foreign to Goldman’s world of ideas. They clashed furiously, but Demi’s encouragement sustained her through the first year of writing, which meant reliving the past and resurrecting painful memories. Peggy Guggenheim started a fund for her material security, Miriam Lerner replaced Demi, and several women typed the manuscript. Most importantly, Sasha (Alexander Berkman) helped revise the manuscript for eighteen months, proving remarkably objective and critical. Sasha suggested the title Living My Life, and Goldman dedicates the book as tribute to all who came into her life.
Arrival in New York
Goldman arrived in New York City on August 15, 1889, aged twenty, by West Shore train from Rochester, reaching Weehawken at eight in the morning and taking a ferry to New York. She carried three addresses: a married aunt, a young medical student met in New Haven, and the Freiheit, a German anarchist paper published by Johann Most. Her possessions were meager: five dollars, a small hand-bag, and a sewing-machine checked as baggage. Walking from West Forty-second Street to the Bowery took three hours in August heat. Her aunt and uncle, who ran a photographic gallery, questioned her about leaving her husband and offered lodging but insisted she find work immediately. She invented a friend on Henry Street to escape, leaving her bag.
She sought A. Solotaroff, a young anarchist she’d heard lecture in New Haven, finding him on Montgomery Street in a tenement. He shared his apartment with his family but gave her his room, and knew two sisters—Anna and Helen Minkin—looking for a third girl to share their flat. Solotaroff took her to Sachs’s café on Suffolk Street, headquarters of East Side radicals. There she heard a powerful voice order “Extra-large steak! Extra cup of coffee!”—Alexander Berkman, “no more than a boy, hardly eighteen, but with the neck and chest of a giant.” Berkman invited her to hear Johann Most speak that night. Most’s speech denounced American conditions, the Haymarket tragedy, and the execution of Chicago anarchists. Despite his disfigured jaw, he seemed “transformed into some primitive power,” and Goldman was overwhelmed.
The Chicago Martyrs
That night she recalled the events of 1887. She and her sister Helena had followed the Chicago trial, attending a German socialist group in Rochester’s Germania Hall. A speaker, Johanna Greie, lectured on the Chicago case, describing the 1886 strikes for an eight-hour workday, the McCormick Harvester Company meeting attacked by police, and the May 4 Haymarket Square meeting. Mayor Carter Harrison had attested to its orderliness, but Captain Ward’s police attacked, and an explosion killed police officers. The trial was “the worst frame-up in the history of the United States”—the District Attorney declared “anarchy was on trial.” Eight innocent men were convicted: Parsons, Spies, Louis Lingg, Fischer, and George Engel sentenced to hang; Michael Schwab and Samuel Fielden to life imprisonment; Neebe to fifteen years. Greie told Goldman: “I have a feeling that you will know them better as you learn their ideal, and that you will make their cause your own.” Helena joked her sister would become “a dangerous anarchist.”
Early Factory Work in St. Petersburg
Goldman recounts arriving in St. Petersburg in the winter of 1882 from Königsberg with her Mother and two little brothers to join Father, who had lost his position after the family business failed. With no savings, her sister Helena was the only bread-winner. Mother borrowed three hundred rubles and invested in a grocery store, but it yielded little, forcing the narrator to find work. She knitted shawls at home, earning twelve rubles a month, though she hated the work and her eyes suffered. Father’s cousin, who now owned a glove factory, offered to teach her the trade. The factory was far away, requiring rising at five in the morning for a seven o’clock start. Rooms were stuffy, unventilated, and dark, lit only by oil lamps. Six hundred workers made costly gloves for very small pay, but had time for noon meals and tea twice daily, could talk and sing, and were not driven or harassed.
Garson’s Factory in Rochester
Now in America, in the “Flower City” of New York State, the narrator works at Garson’s clothingworks, a “model factory.” Though rooms were large, bright, and airy compared to the glove factory, the work was harder, the day endless with only half an hour for lunch, and iron discipline forbade free movement—even going to the toilet required permission. Constant surveillance by the foreman weighed on her. Only her neighbor, frail little Tanya, seemed similarly affected. One morning Tanya fainted. The narrator called for the foreman, but machine noise drowned her voice. The stopped machines attracted the foreman, who accused Tanya of “shamming.” The narrator cried, “You are a liar and a brute!” She loosened Tanya’s waist and squeezed orange juice into her mouth. The foreman excused Tanya for the day, and the narrator said she would accompany her, offering to have pay deducted. The foreman retorted, “You can go to hell, you wildcat!” They went to a coffee place, spent forty cents on food and the rest on a street-car ride to the park, where they forgot their tasks.
The Cloakmakers’ Strike and Annie Netter
The narrator received a call for help from Joseph Barondess, a man she had met previously. He belonged to a group of young Jewish socialists and anarchists who organized the cloakmakers and other Yiddish unions. Though the group contained more informed men and abler speakers, Barondess stood out for his greater simplicity and practical rather than scholarly mind. He directed the cloakmakers’ strike.
Nearly all East Side public speakers were drawn into the struggle, almost all men except Annie Netter, a young girl known for tireless activity in anarchist and labor ranks. She had worked in strikes including those of the Knights of Labor, which had been the storm-center of the intense campaigns of the eighties, reaching its zenith in the eight-hour fight led by Parsons, Spies, Fielden and other men who died in Chicago. The organization declined when Terence V. Powderly, Grand Master of the Knights of Labor, allied with enemies of his comrades being rushed to their doom; Powderly allegedly helped pull the strings that strangled the Chicago men in return for thirty pieces of silver. Militant workers withdrew, leaving the Knights as a dumping-ground for unscrupulous job-hunters.
Annie Netter was among the first to leave the “Judas organization.” She belonged to the Pioneers of Liberty, to which most active Jewish anarchists in New York belonged. Her father, who had developed from religious orthodoxy to atheism and socialism, sustained her efforts. He was a great scholar of warm humanity. The Netter home behind their grocery store became an oasis and intellectual center; Mrs. Netter kept open house with samovar and zakusky always available.
Gatherings at the Netters’
The narrator, who had never known a real home, basked in the understanding between the Netter parents and children. Frequenters included David Edelstadt, a fine idealistic nature whose songs of revolt were beloved by Yiddish-speaking radicals; Bovshover, writing as Basil Dahl, an impulsive man of exceptional poetic gifts; young Michael Cohn, M. Katz, Girzhdansky, Louis, and other able young men. Barondess often participated and sent for the narrator to help in the strike.
The Narrator’s Strike Work and the Dance Incident
The narrator threw herself into getting girls to join the strike through meetings, concerts, socials, and dances, speaking often and becoming less disturbed on the platform. Within weeks she brought scores of girls into the strikers’ ranks.
At a dance, a cousin of Sasha took her aside, gravely announcing that it did not behoove an agitator to dance with such reckless abandon; it was undignified for one becoming a force in the anarchist movement, and her frivolity would hurt the Cause. She grew furious, insisting that a Cause standing for anarchism, release, and freedom from conventions should not demand denial of life and joy. She would not become a nun; the movement should not become a cloister. “I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody’s right to beautiful, radiant things.” She would live her ideal despite prisons, persecution, everything, even condemnation from her closest comrades.
Applause mingled with protests that the Cause must come above everything; Russian revolutionists had never been conscious of self. Sasha’s voice was loudest. He stood near Anna Minkin; the narrator had noticed their growing interest before their last altercation, after which Sasha moved out of their flat. Her heart yearned for her “impetuous, headstrong lover,” she longed to call him Dushenka, but his face was set with reproach, and she danced no more that evening.
The Strike Settlement
Called into the committee room, she found Joseph Barondess and other strike leaders, including Professor T. H. Garside, a Scotchman, formerly lecturer for the Knights of Labor, now heading the strike. Garside, about thirty-five, tall, pale, languid-looking, gentle and ingratiating, resembled pictures of Christ, always trying to pacify conflicting elements. Garside said the strike would be lost without compromise. The narrator disagreed and objected; several committee members upheld her, but Garside’s influence prevailed and the strike was settled per his suggestions.
Fedya and the Narrator’s Illness
Strenuous weeks gave way to lectures, evenings at the Netters’ or the flat, and efforts to secure employment. Fedya began working with crayons enlarging photographs, declaring he could not waste Helen’s and the narrator’s money on paints, feeling he would never become a great painter. The narrator suspected he wanted to earn money to relieve her of hard work.
She had not been feeling well, especially during periods, taking to bed in excruciating pain for days. This had been so since her great shock when Mother slapped her face, growing worse after catching cold on the journey from Königsberg to St. Petersburg. In late 1881, the family—Mother, two brothers, and the narrator—were smuggled across the border. Smugglers warned they would wade through deep snow and a half-frozen brook. At five in the morning, shivering, they reached the brook separating German and Russian frontiers. A few rubles induced patrolling soldiers to turn their backs. They plunged in, Mother loaded with bundles, the narrator carrying her little brother. The chill froze her blood; stinging sensation in spine, abdomen, and legs like hot irons. She wanted to scream but feared the soldiers. At the inn on the Russian side she received hot tea with maliny, hot bricks, and warm covering, but the damage was done—the severe cold she caught on that crossing would plague her for years, leaving her incapacitated during her menstrual periods and forcing her to take to bed in excruciating pain for days at a time.
The Head Matron and the First Night
The narrator is brought before the Head Matron, a tall, stolid-faced woman who takes her “pedigree,” beginning with her religion. When the narrator declares she is an atheist, the Matron states that atheism is prohibited and that she must attend church. The narrator refuses, citing her disbelief and her refusal to be a hypocrite, and asks about a synagogue, as she comes from Jewish people. The Matron curtly replies that Jewish services are held on Saturday afternoons, but since the narrator is the only Jewish female prisoner, she cannot permit her to go among so many men. After a bath and a change into the prison uniform, she is locked in her cell.
Prepared for the old, damp prison and small, dark cells from Most’s descriptions of Blackwell’s Island, she still experiences suffocation upon being locked in. She finds an iron cot and falls asleep from exhaustion. She is awakened by a burning in her eyes from a lamp held close to the bars. A thin, ascetic-faced evening matron congratulates her on her sleep and tells her to undress. Unable to sleep, she endures the coarse blanket and shadows. A gong summons her; cells are unlocked, and blue and white striped figures form a line. Commands of “March!” and “Wash!” dictate a rushed routine with soiled towels. Breakfast is a slice of bread and warm brownish water. She is taken to the sewing-room with a group of women.
The Daily Routine and the Lock-Step
The line-forming procedure repeats three times daily. Ten minutes of talk are allowed after meals, producing a torrent of words that ends in sudden silence. The sewing-room is large and light, but the light intensifies the hideousness of the baggy uniforms. Her cell is gray and damp. The nightly locking of cells is the worst experience; seventy doors crash shut. More harrowing is the daily lock-step march to the river carrying buckets of excrement.
The narrator is put in charge of the sewing-shop, cutting cloth and preparing work for two dozen women, and keeping accounts. She welcomes the work but finds evenings torturous. She mentally calculates her remaining nights (nearly two hundred and ninety) and Sasha’s (over twenty-five hundred if he serves his seven-year sentence). Dread overcomes her that Sasha cannot survive sleepless nights in prison; she thinks he might be better dead, as Frick was not dead and Sasha’s youth is being sacrificed, perhaps for nothing. She questions if his Attentat was in vain, but insists to herself that no sacrifice is lost for a great ideal.
Defiance and Friendship
The head matron demands better work results, comparing her unfavorably to the previous prisoner in charge. The narrator resents being a slave-driver, stating she hates slaves and their drivers, considers herself an inmate, and prefers punishment to denying her ideals. She decides she would take the dungeon if offered the indignity of standing in a corner facing a blackboard, but she is not punished. News of her refusal spreads; the women, who had kept aloof due to her reputation as an atheist anarchist, now befriend her. They visit her on Sunday, offering services like laundry and darning. They share their troubles, hatred of the head matron, and confidences about flirtations with male convicts.
Her three weeks in the Tombs proved to her that crime results from poverty, as most defendants were from the lowest strata. In the penitentiary, despair possesses the prisoners, unveiling their mental darkness and superstition. Only half a dozen of the seventy inmates show intelligence; the rest are outcasts without social consciousness, unable to see themselves as victims of injustice. Yet they are capable of sympathy and devotion.
Illness and the Sick-Ward
She falls ill with rheumatism from the damp cell. The head matron opposes her hospitalization but submits to the visiting physician’s order. The penitentiary lacks a “steady” physician; inmates are treated by staff from the nearby Charity Hospital, supervised by Dr. White, a humane man from New York City. The sick-ward is the largest, brightest room, with views of a lawn and the East River. A month’s rest and kindness cure her. Dr. White reads her card (“Inciting to riot”) and dismisses it as “Piffle!” He offers her a job as a nurse, admitting no one knows nursing. He will teach her to take pulse and temperature. He will speak to the Warden and head matron.
She takes up the work in the sixteen-bed ward, treating everything from operations to childbirth. Though long and strenuous, she loves the job. She receives letters and daily messages from Ed, dinners from Austrian anarchist restaurant owners (brought by Ed), and fruit from Fedya. She shares her bounty with the patients, who are derelicts on the “social dung-heap.” She is given entire charge of the ward, including dividing special rations (milk, beef tea, eggs, crackers, sugar). When rations go missing, she reports it. A day matron relays the head matron’s message that it doesn’t matter. The narrator has studied this head matron, who dislikes non-Anglo-Saxons, especially the Irish and Jews. A prisoner tells her the missing rations were given to two husky Negro prisoners, as the matron favors colored inmates, who spy on others in return. The narrator hates discrimination and feels powerless.
After clashes, the matron leaves her alone. Once, the matron demands she translate a Russian letter for another prisoner; the narrator refuses, stating she is not employed as a translator and will not pry into private mail. The matron threatens her with her cell, loss of commutation, and a hard stay, but the narrator refuses.
Post-Release Trauma and the Welcome Meeting
The narrator describes the period following her release from prison as a “nightmare.” She craves quiet, peace, and privacy but is surrounded by people with meetings nearly every evening. She lives in a daze, haunted by fellow convicts and prison noises—the command “Close!” followed by crashing iron doors and clanking chains pursues her even when facing audiences.
At the Thalia Theater, a welcome meeting is held with many well-known New Yorkers from various social groups. She sits listless, in a stupor, drifting back to Blackwell’s Island. The audience transforms into pale, frightened women prisoners; speakers’ voices take on the harshness of the head matron. Maria Louise, presiding, touches her shoulder, having called her several times, saying “You seem as if asleep.” When she tries to speak, her lips move but no sound comes. Hideous figures in fantastic stripes emerge from every aisle. She whispers to Maria Louise, begging her to explain she feels dizzy. Ed leads her behind the stage to a dressing-room. She has never before lost control of herself or her voice. Ed reassures her that every sensitive person carries the prison in his heart for a long time, urging her to leave the city with him.
Maria Rodda
A beautiful voice reaches the dressing-room. Ed identifies the speaker as Maria Rodda, “an Italian girl anarchist,” only sixteen, recently arrived in America.
Washington and the Reitzel “Friends”
Goldman’s lectures in Washington lacked their usual inspiration, her distress over Ed weighing heavily upon her. She nevertheless gained a footing and made friends, most notably Susan Patten, whom she knew through Sasha as one of his constant American correspondents. Goldman valued Patten for that connection and for her fine spirit.
Speaking before a German free-thought society, Goldman afterward met a group of Reitzel Freunde—readers of the Armer Teufel—most of whom looked “more like butchers than idealists.” One man, a United States Government employee, spoke of beauty in art as being for “the choice few,” rejecting anarchism because “it wanted to make all alike.” He asked how a hod-carrier could claim equal rights with an educated man, assuming Goldman and other anarchists used equality only as “bait,” and declared “the rabble should be made to pay.” When Goldman asked how long he had read the Armer Teufel and he replied “since its first issue,” she retorted that her friend Robert had been “casting his pearls before a swine.” The man angrily left amid laughter.
Another Reitzel “friend,” a brewer from Cincinnati, approached Goldman about sex, having heard she was the “great champion of free love.” He found her young and charming, not a “rigid blue-stocking.” He claimed to believe in free love but thought most people unripe for it, especially women who “try to hold on to the man”—though “Emma Goldman, that’s another matter.” His lewd manner nauseated her. She retired, but he knocked persistently at her door, identifying himself as “a friend.” She threatened to wake the house; he pleaded, revealing he was a married man with grown children who thought she believed in free love, then hurried off.
Goldman reflected on the futility of lofty ideals: the government clerk who places himself above the hod-carrier, the respectable man who uses free love for clandestine affairs—both readers of Reitzel, “the brilliant rebel and idealist.” Their heads and hearts remained “as sterile as the Sahara.” A sense of futility and dismal isolation overcame her.
Pittsburgh and Sasha’s Escape Plan
Traveling from Washington to Pittsburgh in pouring rain, Goldman felt chilled and oppressed by memories of Homestead and Sasha. At the station, Carl Nold and Henry Bauer met her; both had been liberated from the Western Penitentiary in May 1897. She had never met Bauer before. Carl brought back their first meeting in November 1892; their correspondence during Carl’s imprisonment had strengthened their friendship. Prison had made Carl more thoughtful but not dampened his joy in life. Bauer, large and jovial, called himself “the elephant” walking between them.
Goldman usually stayed with Harry Gordon and his family—Harry a faithful worker, Mrs. Gordon simple and tender-hearted, attached to Goldman. But Carl and Henry insisted on celebrating first. There were to be no lectures in Pittsburgh; Carl and Henry had begun a new move for Sasha’s release—an appeal to the Board of Pardons backed exclusively by labor elements. Goldman had no faith in such steps but hid her pessimism.
At a private dinner, they drank a silent first glass to Sasha. Carl and Henry recounted their prison experience with Sasha and delivered a message they feared to trust to mail: Sasha was planning an escape. His scheme was “masterly,” but Goldman reflected on its futility: in America he would be a hunted man; in Russia, escapes had succeeded, and political prisoners could count on workers’ and peasants’ sympathy. In the United States, nine-tenths of workers would join the hunt. Nold and Bauer agreed but asked her not to communicate her fears—Sasha’s eyes were failing, his health breaking, and he had brooded on suicide. The escape hope energized him; they hoped to induce him to wait until legal means were exhausted.
The Hotel and Carl’s Home
After midnight, they went to a hotel kept by a reader of the Armer Teufel. The man was friendly, but a woman’s hysterical voice screamed: “A room for Emma Goldman! This is a respectable family hotel, no place for that shameless creature, the free lover of a convict!” The husband banged his fist, demanding to know who was boss, calling her “Xantippe.” The woman slunk out, but Goldman insisted on leaving.
Carl suggested his “den”—one room and a kitchen shared with his wife and little boy. Goldman dreaded going into people’s houses uninvited but agreed. At Carl’s place in Allegheny, his wife Nellie, “buxom” and “somewhat disheveled,” seemed to resent the intrusion. There was one bed, with the child sleeping. Carl said he and Nellie would sleep on the floor; Goldman would share the bed with the child. She lay down half-dressed and fell asleep, then awoke to shouting: “He’s killing me! Help! Police!” She saw two bodies fighting—Nellie had Carl pressed down, trying to get at his throat while yelling for the police. Goldman pulled the woman off, snatched her things, and fled into the rain to Henry’s place. The three walked to Pittsburgh, hotels in Allegheny being closed; they were refused everywhere, Goldman looking wet and disreputable without her suitcase. Near morning they found a hotel.
In bed, Goldman saw “dark shadows”—the penitentiary walls holding Sasha, her own prison days, the ghastly experience—blending into “a grinning, fantastic mockery of darkness and despair.” Yet a faint shimmer of light remained.
Lecture Tour Begins
The narrator starts a tour equipped with a dozen prepared lectures and a sample of an invention (an album). She hopes to win converts to “our Cause” and secure orders, with her percentage on sales covering travel expenses, relieving comrades of supporting her tours.
Philadelphia: Charles Shilling
Charles Shilling, a Philadelphia anarchist met on previous visits, arranged lectures and hosted her with his family. Both he and Mrs. Shilling were charming hosts; Charles was an effective organizer. She delivered six lectures on: the New Woman, the Absurdity of Non-Resistance to Evil, the Basis of Morality, Freedom, Charity, and Patriotism. English lecturing was difficult, but she thrived during question periods, becoming more caustic with opposition. After ten days, she left for Pittsburgh.
Pittsburgh and Homestead
Carl, Henry, Harry Gordon, and Emma Lee arranged fourteen lectures in Pittsburgh and adjoining towns, but none in Homestead—no hall was available. Her first pilgrimage was to the Western Penitentiary with Emma Lee. Walking along the wall, she touched its rough surface, wishing thoughts could penetrate to Sasha, imprisoned nearly five years. The Warden and keepers had failed to break his spirit. Sustained by friends including Harry Kelly, the Gordons, Nold, and Bauer, who worked since November 1897 on a pardon appeal.
Paris with Hippolyte
Goldman arrived in Paris with Hippolyte on a drizzling January morning, taking rooms at a hotel on Boulevard Saint-Michel. The city brought back the disappointment of her 1896 visit, when German anarchist hosts had been too exhausted from work to accompany her and her French had been too weak to explore alone; she had seen nothing but the Bois de Boulogne. Now, for a month, she and Hippolyte immersed themselves in the city’s revolutionary heritage. At the Mur des Fédérés in Père Lachaise cemetery, she stood before the wall where the Communards had made their final stand, slain by the order of Thiers and Galliffet. The Place de la Bastille evoked the great revolution’s suffering and hope.
France, she reflected, was anarchism’s cradle, with Proudhon its greatest figure. French police brutality and court proceedings differed markedly from American methods—the difference between a people seasoned in revolutionary traditions and one that had merely skimmed the surface of independence struggles. Unlike Americans, no French comrade masked anarchism with the term “philosophic.” The revolutionary-syndicalist movement, given impetus by Pelloutier, was permeated with anarchist tendencies. The Université Populaire, backed by anarchists, enlisted university men to deliver popular science lectures. Writers like Zola, Richepin, Mirbeau, and Brieux, along with the plays of Théâtre Antoine, constituted anarchist literature alongside Kropotkin; artists such as Meunier, Rodin, Steinlen, and Grandjouan found greater appreciation in revolutionary ranks than among bourgeois art sponsors.
Victor Dave and Hippolyte’s Jealousy
Goldman was most impressed by Victor Dave, an old comrade with forty years of anarchist activity behind him—a former member of the first International, coworker of Michael Bakunin, and teacher of Johann Most. She knew of his role in the accusations against Peukert regarding John Neve’s arrest and conviction. Dave remained certain of Peukert’s guilt without personal animosity. At sixty, alert and jovial, he lived with his invalid companion Marie. A great linguist, he helped arrange congress materials and translations.
Hippolyte disliked Dave, refusing outings yet resenting being left behind; liquor incited abuse. His resentment extended to every man of Goldman’s acquaintance—two Italians from Cuban freedom work and the Summit strike, and later Palavicini with his wife and child. Despite growing distress, Goldman could not think of parting.
Carl Stone’s Letter and the Decision to Return
Carl Stone wrote that his and Herman’s allowance had been solely for medical study in Switzerland; learning that she was “at propaganda and with a new lover,” he demanded she choose. Goldman replied: “E. G. the woman and her ideas are inseparable… Keep your money.” She doubted Herman Miller’s involvement. She had given Stone’s two hundred dollars to Eric for the tunnel. When the allowance stopped, she concluded Herman had changed his mind, recalled Tchaikovsky’s view that one cannot serve both ideal and profession, and decided to return to America.
Panizza, Missed Wilde, and Max Baginski
Oscar Panizza, whose writings in Armer Teufel had delighted her, visited with Dr. Eugene Schmidt, inviting her to see Oscar Wilde. Hippolyte angrily insisted she attend a committee session. She declined Panizza, arranging a Saturday luncheon instead. Friday, Schmidt reported Panizza had left unexpectedly. During a walk in the Luxembourg Gardens, Goldman told of defending Wilde against “miserable hypocrites”; Schmidt questioned whether it had been legally unjust, though possibly psychologically so. They debated inversion, perversion, and sex variation, Schmidt somewhat scandalized by her frankness.
A letter from Max announced that he and Puck were in Paris. Hippolyte surprisingly welcomed meeting Max Baginski. Goldman visited them; Max’s greeting dissolved her resentment. Their evening until three in the morning cheered Hippolyte, who became more sociable.
Sex Discussion Controversy and King Humbert’s Assassination
Kate Austen’s paper on the American free-love movement’s history faced opposition. Victor explained that older French comrades, reacting against French cynicism about sex, had “outdone the Puritans,” fearing sex discussion increased misconceptions of anarchism. One group refused to have American sex reports read publicly. Goldman protested, threatening to ask U.S. comrades to relieve her of credentials.
In a café, Goldman read of Gaetano Bresci killing King Humbert. She remembered Bresci from Paterson, New Jersey—not excitable. Victor attributed the deed to Milan’s 1898 hunger riots, when General Bava Beccaris had massacred starving demonstrators and King Humbert had decorated him. Max thought Goldman lucky to be abroad, as she would otherwise be blamed. She worried about Bresci’s fate, recalling Luccheni’s treatment.
Neo-Malthusian Congress and Cultural Life
Victor explained the secret congress, proscribed by French law. Dr. Drysdale, his sister, Paul Robin, and Madeleine Verné backed the movement. Robin had established Sempuis, a school for destitute and “bad” children on land he bought. The secret sessions, each in different locations, drew a dozen delegates. Goldman marveled at their frank demonstration of preventive methods, thinking of her East Side patients. Delegates laughed about Anthony Comstock supervising American morals; she noted France’s secrecy too. She received literature and contraceptives for future New York work.
Concerts at the Trocadero included a Finnish orchestra with Mme Aïno Ackté, the Russian Balalaika Orchestra, Wagner, and Ysaÿe. The Théâtre Libre presented its daring productions.
Justus Schwab’s Illness and Ed’s Visit
Settled in her new room, Goldman visited Justus Schwab, finding him in bed, “a mere shadow of his former self.” She was moved to tears seeing the giant so wasted. Mrs. Schwab had been working hard caring for the saloon; Goldman begged to nurse Justus, and Mrs. Schwab promised, though certain the sick man would accept no attendant but herself. Goldman noted the tender relationship between Justus and his family—his wife had been his companion through all the years, formerly the picture of health, but now visibly worn by his illness, worry, and overwork.
While talking with Mrs. Schwab, Ed entered, becoming embarrassed at seeing Goldman; she too was confused. He quickly regained composure. Mrs. Schwab excused herself to attend her patient, leaving them alone—a painful moment neither could immediately address.
Conversation with Ed About His Child
Goldman had not been in touch with Ed during her stay abroad but knew through common friends of his child’s birth. She asked how it felt to be a father. He became animated, launching into a poem over his little daughter, praising her charm and remarkable intelligence. Goldman was amused to see this “baby-hater” enthusiastic—she remembered he had always refused to move into a house with children. Ed insisted his excitement wasn’t because he was the father but because his little girl was “really an exceptional child.” This amazed her, recalling his old saying that “
A Miner’s Home and the Raines Hotel
Goldman described two experiences from a trip that brought her face to face with the brutal realities of working-class life. In a mine, she spoke to the miners during their lunch-hour and met an elderly man, “Grandpa Jones,” aged ninety, who had labored in the pits for seventy years, working alongside his great-grandchild—a child who claimed to be fourteen but was actually eight. Both worked ten hours daily in the darkness. After a meeting, a miner invited her to his home. The room held three occupants: two children on a narrow cot and a young girl in a folding bed, which Goldman shared. The parents and an infant slept next door. The stifling air made her cough, and the woman gave her hot milk. The infant cried through the night. In the morning, Goldman learned the baby was bottle-fed because the mother’s milk was insufficient. She realized with shame that she had drunk the baby’s milk. The woman admitted it, saying Goldman looked tired and coughed. Goldman felt a profound sense of wonder at the woman’s generosity despite such poverty.
Returning to New York, Goldman found a message from Dr. Hoffmann asking her to nurse Mrs. Spenser again. Goldman could only do day duty due to the Turner campaign, but Mrs. Spenser later urged night care. Goldman knew Mrs. Spenser lived from brothel proceeds, now disguised as a “Raines hotel.” Goldman argued that the Raines Law multiplied vice rather than abolishing it. It relieved keepers of responsibility toward inmates and increased revenue from prostitution. Girls were compelled to solicit on the street, enduring weather and illness, paying graft to police for the right to “work” in territories. Broadway cost more in graft than the Bowery. Policemen prevented unauthorized competition, and trespassing girls were arrested or sent to the workhouse. Hotel-keepers gave street girls a percentage from liquor they induced customers to consume, which became their main income after brothels were abolished. Girls had to drink heavily to encourage customers to drink more. Goldman found the scene unbearable. Dr. Hoffmann said Mrs. Spenser had no hope of permanent cure due to drug use. Goldman resigned; Mrs. Spenser raged and said she preferred Goldman leave entirely.
The Turner Campaign and Russian Freedom Work
While Turner’s appeal was pending, attorneys secured his release on five-thousand-dollar bail. He toured, lecturing to crowded houses. His arrest and threatened deportation brought press attention to the Anti-Anarchist Law and anarchism. Turner’s leave from his union was expiring, so he returned to England without awaiting the Supreme Court verdict. The decision upheld the law’s constitutionality and sustained deportation. Goldman noted the statute would defeat its own ends: European comrades would no longer confide ideas to Immigration Department officials.
Goldman turned to English propaganda, including Russian freedom struggles. The Friends of Russian Freedom, an American group, had done admirable work but was inactive; the radical Yiddish press was confined to the East Side. Czarist propaganda through the Russian Church, Consulate, and the New York Herald pictured the autocrat as kindhearted while denouncing revolutionists as criminals. Two Russians arrived: Rosenbaum and Nikolaev, members of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party. Rosenbaum welded East Side militants into an S.R. section. Goldman joined despite disagreeing with their non-governmental ideas, attracted by their Russian work. Catherine Breshkovskaya, called “Babushka” (Grandmother), was approaching. Nikolaev suggested Goldman contact George Kennan and Lyman Abbott. Goldman laughed, saying her name would queer Breshkovskaya’s chances. She thought of Alice Stone Blackwell, whom she had corresponded with since 1902 regarding Russian poetry translations. Blackwell agreed to visit, bringing William Dudley Foulke, president of the reorganized Friends of Russian Freedom. Foulke was a Roosevelt devotee. Goldman used the name “Miss Smith.” At 210 East Thirteenth Street, Foulke arrived breathless after five flights. The conspiratorial meeting succeeded. A New York branch formed with Reverend Minot J. Savage as president and Professor Robert Erskine Ely as secretary. Goldman recalled meeting Ely during Peter Kropotkin’s 1901 visit; Ely feared connection with anarchists might ruin his standing. Kropotkin, though an anarchist, was also a prince and scientist who lectured at the Lowell Institute. Goldman recounted Kropotkin’s Chicago anecdote: society women led by Mrs. Potter Palmer invited him to luncheon; he declined, saying “you may have the Prince, and I will go to my comrades” to visit the Haymarket martyrs’ graves at Waldheim. Goldman kept her identity hidden from Ely, acting through intermediaries.
Breshkovskaya’s Visit
When Breshkovskaya arrived, Goldman waited rather than crowd her. Breshkovskaya asked to see Goldman. Goldman had long admired Russian revolutionary women: Vera Zassulitch, Sophia Perovskaya, Jessie Helfman, Vera Figner, and Breshkovskaya. She found Breshkovskaya in a barren, badly lit flat, dressed in black with a shawl and kerchief, gray hair exposed, looking like a peasant woman with large gray eyes. At sixty-two, she seemed youthful. Goldman felt immediate kinship. Breshkovskaya’s first New York appearance was at Cooper Union, where she delivered a sweeping speech. The press praised her, generous because her attack targeted Russia, not America. She spoke in French at the Sunrise Club; Goldman interpreted. A gathering at Goldman’s apartment included Ernest Crosby, Bolton Hall, the Coryells, Gilbert E. Roe, University Settlement members, Phelps Stokes, Kellogg Durland, Arthur Ballard, William English Walling, and others.
The Russian Revolution and Orleneff’s Troupe
Goldman responded ecstatically to the news of the Russian Revolution of October 1905. She recounted the retaliatory killings of Grand Duke Sergius and Shipiagin by Kalayev and Balmashov, members of the Fighting Organization of the Social Revolutionary Party, following the January 22 massacre. A general strike swept Russia, joined even by prostitutes, and the radical East Side of New York lived in delirium. Amid this fervor, Orleneff and his troupe debuted at a small, poorly equipped theater on Third Street. The audience’s enthusiasm elevated the performances. The theater became an oasis, attracting hundreds of Americans, including Ethel Barrymore, her brother John, Grace George, Minnie Maddern Fiske and her husband Harrison Gray Fiske, Ben Greet, Margaret Anglin, and Henry Miller. “Miss Smith,” Goldman’s pseudonym, served as Orleneff’s manager, interpreting compliments and diplomatically softening his replies. At one after-theater party, a prominent manager asked Orleneff peculiar questions about his acting choices; Orleneff erupted in fury, calling the man a fool and suggesting he be a chimney-sweep, while Nazimova pretended not to hear.
The revolution was crushed in blood, and renewed massacres of Jews in Russia turned even advanced Russians and Jews against everything Russian. The audience dwindled, and rumors spread that Orleneff’s troupe included members of the Black Hundred.
