CHARACTER ANALYSIS: EMMA GOLDMAN
Emma Goldman previously called “the most dangerous woman in America” and now one of the most famous heroines of the history of liberal democracy. She was a great orator and a gifted writer who sacrificed her life for her ideals. She is considered one of the strongest leaders of Anarchism and her activities have had enduring effect on anarchist political theory, women’s rights, radicalism, birth control and etc (wikipedia.com).
She was born June 27, 1869 in Kovno, Lithuania, later Russian Empire (answers.com). The anti-Semitism wave made her Jewish family to migrate to the United States. Young Emma who was encountered with inequality, violence and poverty in Russia faced labor force dissatisfaction and worker union strikes in America. By the time capitalism and thrusts had become leading economic forces and the labor unions were struggling to be born to defend the work force rights who were from the lowest and weakest layers of the society (wikipedia.com). Emma, as a poor girl of an immigrant family worked as a seamster and was engaged and influenced by the events. Emma Goldman lived in a critical period of the western history. Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, Spanish civil war, Fascism, Nazism and World War I in international scope and Capitalism, Red Scare, First wave of feminism with the women suffrage movement labor unions inside America. (about.com, wikipedia.com)
Emma’s mother was a happily married woman with two daughters Helena and Elena when her husband died. She then entered a family made marriage with Abraham Goldman. A poor unsuccessful worker, with a bad temper, who hoped for a boy and believed that a girl would be another sign of failure (wikipedia.com). However, Emma was born as his first child. And three sons followed. He punished his children and above all Emma who was the most rebellious. After sometimes studying at school she was deprived to continue as she was a girl and according to her father “girls do not have to learn much! All a Jewish daughter needs to know is how to prepare gefilte fish, cut noodles fine, and give the man plenty of children” (wikipedia, Goldman,living p12). So Emma, fond of study, started studying for herself both books and events around her. Among them tow were very much inspiring. One was a novel named “what is to be done?” by Nikolai Chernyshevsky. The other was studying the Nihilists responsible for assassinating Alexander II of Russia. Unhappy atmosphere and poverty of the family and witnessing the society as a place for inequality and violence beside the revolutionary movements and schools of thought all helped forming her mind (wikipedia.com).
In 1885, she migrated with her sister, Helena, to the United States just to be followed by her other members of family the year after. Her family had to escape the anti-Semitism waves which were growing in Russia. They settled in Rochester, New York and she started working in a factory. After sometimes she married but separated soon. Once, she returned to her husband but couldn’t endure. This time, her family calling her “loose” rejected her and she went to New York. There she met Alexander Berkman and Johann Most, tow leaders of the Anarchism. Berkman became her life long friend and lover and Most taught her methods of oratory and public speaking. She very soon founded her base of thought as an Anarshist and gradually became a powerful orator talking for the public of her revolutionary ideas (wikipedia.com).
They believed in direct effort in making reforms or stimulating workers to revolt. The first and most important effort was the plan to assassinate Henry Clay Frick. Frick was the factory manager for the Carnegie Steel Company and a fierce opponent of the labor union. Emma and Berkman decided that by killing him they can stimulate the workers to revolt against the Capitalism. Berkman did the deed and Emma stood behind to explain the motives for the people. However, the attempt was unsuccessful and Frick, though injured, stayed alive. Berkman was captured and sentenced to twenty tow years prison. To their bad luck, workers and anarchists both condemned the action (wikipedia.com).
Emma Goldman finally gets arrested for her activities. In prison she reads many books including medicine and the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne, poet Walt Whitman and philosopher John Stuart Mill. After release, she traveled to Europe to follow her favorite fields in nursing. She met anarchist leaders and hold lectures as well during the time. In 1899, Goldman returned to US, met Hippolyte Havel, an anarchist leader and began a relationship with him. They went to France together and founded the International Anarchist Congress in Paris (wikipedia.com).
In 1901 she was mistakenly put under persecution for President McKinley’s assassination (about.com, Jewish Women Association). The person who did it though admitting her separation of the issue but had said that by taking part in one of her lectures on anarchism had decided to do so. By the time she had become an absolute unpleasant figure for the American government. “Meanwhile, socialism gained support over anarchism among US radicals” (wikipedia.com) and Theodore Roosevelt informed of his decision to suppress anarchists. Therefore, Emma decided to side from her activities for a while and by using the false name of E.G. Smith took on some private nursing jobs (about.com, JWA).
Emma Goldman previously called “the most dangerous woman in America” and now one of the most famous heroines of the history of liberal democracy. She was a great orator and a gifted writer who sacrificed her life for her ideals. She is considered one of the strongest leaders of Anarchism and her activities have had enduring effect on anarchist political theory, women’s rights, radicalism, birth control and etc (wikipedia.com).
She was born June 27, 1869 in Kovno, Lithuania, later Russian Empire (answers.com). The anti-Semitism wave made her Jewish family to migrate to the United States. Young Emma who was encountered with inequality, violence and poverty in Russia faced labor force dissatisfaction and worker union strikes in America. By the time capitalism and thrusts had become leading economic forces and the labor unions were struggling to be born to defend the work force rights who were from the lowest and weakest layers of the society (wikipedia.com). Emma, as a poor girl of an immigrant family worked as a seamster and was engaged and influenced by the events. Emma Goldman lived in a critical period of the western history. Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, Spanish civil war, Fascism, Nazism and World War I in international scope and Capitalism, Red Scare, First wave of feminism with the women suffrage movement labor unions inside America. (about.com, wikipedia.com)
Emma’s mother was a happily married woman with two daughters Helena and Elena when her husband died. She then entered a family made marriage with Abraham Goldman. A poor unsuccessful worker, with a bad temper, who hoped for a boy and believed that a girl would be another sign of failure (wikipedia.com). However, Emma was born as his first child. And three sons followed. He punished his children and above all Emma who was the most rebellious. After sometimes studying at school she was deprived to continue as she was a girl and according to her father “girls do not have to learn much! All a Jewish daughter needs to know is how to prepare gefilte fish, cut noodles fine, and give the man plenty of children” (wikipedia, Goldman,living p12). So Emma, fond of study, started studying for herself both books and events around her. Among them tow were very much inspiring. One was a novel named “what is to be done?” by Nikolai Chernyshevsky. The other was studying the Nihilists responsible for assassinating Alexander II of Russia. Unhappy atmosphere and poverty of the family and witnessing the society as a place for inequality and violence beside the revolutionary movements and schools of thought all helped forming her mind (wikipedia.com).
In 1885, she migrated with her sister, Helena, to the United States just to be followed by her other members of family the year after. Her family had to escape the anti-Semitism waves which were growing in Russia. They settled in Rochester, New York and she started working in a factory. After sometimes she married but separated soon. Once, she returned to her husband but couldn’t endure. This time, her family calling her “loose” rejected her and she went to New York. There she met Alexander Berkman and Johann Most, tow leaders of the Anarchism. Berkman became her life long friend and lover and Most taught her methods of oratory and public speaking. She very soon founded her base of thought as an Anarshist and gradually became a powerful orator talking for the public of her revolutionary ideas (wikipedia.com).
They believed in direct effort in making reforms or stimulating workers to revolt. The first and most important effort was the plan to assassinate Henry Clay Frick. Frick was the factory manager for the Carnegie Steel Company and a fierce opponent of the labor union. Emma and Berkman decided that by killing him they can stimulate the workers to revolt against the Capitalism. Berkman did the deed and Emma stood behind to explain the motives for the people. However, the attempt was unsuccessful and Frick, though injured, stayed alive. Berkman was captured and sentenced to twenty tow years prison. To their bad luck, workers and anarchists both condemned the action (wikipedia.com).
Emma Goldman finally gets arrested for her activities. In prison she reads many books including medicine and the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne, poet Walt Whitman and philosopher John Stuart Mill. After release, she traveled to Europe to follow her favorite fields in nursing. She met anarchist leaders and hold lectures as well during the time. In 1899, Goldman returned to US, met Hippolyte Havel, an anarchist leader and began a relationship with him. They went to France together and founded the International Anarchist Congress in Paris (wikipedia.com).
In 1901 she was mistakenly put under persecution for President McKinley’s assassination (about.com, Jewish Women Association). The person who did it though admitting her separation of the issue but had said that by taking part in one of her lectures on anarchism had decided to do so. By the time she had become an absolute unpleasant figure for the American government. “Meanwhile, socialism gained support over anarchism among US radicals” (wikipedia.com) and Theodore Roosevelt informed of his decision to suppress anarchists. Therefore, Emma decided to side from her activities for a while and by using the false name of E.G. Smith took on some private nursing jobs (about.com, JWA).
At the time of World War I and the second term of President Woodrow Wilson, the Selective Service Act of 1917 which obligated all men of 21 to 30 to go to war was passed. Goldman saw it as a “militarist aggression driven by capitalism”. Although the war seemed to be for democracy, in reality it was “the imperialist venture fought on behalf of capitalists at the expense of working class and all those who were oppressed” (about.com, JWA). She was imprisoned then under Espionage Act. When she was released the red scare was the horrible issue of the country. Many of the ordinary or important people were deported on the claim that they worked for the communist party or had some communist leanings. Goldman married Jacob Kershner to obtain legal citizenship. But the government by using the Anarchist Exclusion Act deported both Goldman and Berkman with hundreds of other Russians to Russia. Unexpectedly the tow were disillusioned with the dogma of the Bolshevik regime, so left the country and finally reached to Berlin were they lived for several years. There she started writing in the New York World which later became tow books, “My disillusionment in Russia” (1923) and “My further disillusionment in Russia” (1924).Emma Goldman suffered a stroke on Feb. 17, 1940. The great orator became unable to utter a word. Finally, she died in May 14 in Toronto, Canada. The US naturalization and immigration service allowed her body to be brought back to US. She is buried in Chicago among those who were executed after the Hay Market affair (wikipedia.com).
Emma Goldman was a real anarchist, rejecting the orthodoxy and fundamentalist thinking.
She was influenced by Emerson, Chernyshevsky, Wollstonecraft and Nietche. Anarchism was central to her world view. “Anarchism then really stands for the liberation of human mind from the dominion of religion, the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property, Liberation from the shackles and restraints of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth. An order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life according to individual desires, tastes and inclinations” (wikipedia.com).
She also, believed in the absolute destruction of the State to gain absolute freedom (about.com).
On the other hand, she believed that capitalism was inimical to human liberty. As it is after more wealth so more power will be gained to exploit and enslave (about.com).
She is one of the opponents of the marriage. “How much sorrow, misery, humiliation … men and women grown under the iron yoke of our marriage institution and there seems to be no relief, no way out of it.” She believed that women must be independent from all the bondages and try for their individual progress. Despite her liberal views she was not an advocate of women suffrage in the first wave of feminism. She believed that women issue must be solved fundamentally and just gaining suffrage is a means not to count women as equal to men but to conceal the way laws are passed and put into action (about.com).
Emma Goldman was a revolutionist who suffered much for her ideals. Despite her disadvantage to reach to her goals while alive, she was able to put her mark on the history of human being. This paper is not to judge her anyway, but what she tried for, being considered an anti-religion and anti-value at her time, is now praised for as the liberal rights of human being.
Her publications are:
She also, believed in the absolute destruction of the State to gain absolute freedom (about.com).
On the other hand, she believed that capitalism was inimical to human liberty. As it is after more wealth so more power will be gained to exploit and enslave (about.com).
She is one of the opponents of the marriage. “How much sorrow, misery, humiliation … men and women grown under the iron yoke of our marriage institution and there seems to be no relief, no way out of it.” She believed that women must be independent from all the bondages and try for their individual progress. Despite her liberal views she was not an advocate of women suffrage in the first wave of feminism. She believed that women issue must be solved fundamentally and just gaining suffrage is a means not to count women as equal to men but to conceal the way laws are passed and put into action (about.com).
Emma Goldman was a revolutionist who suffered much for her ideals. Despite her disadvantage to reach to her goals while alive, she was able to put her mark on the history of human being. This paper is not to judge her anyway, but what she tried for, being considered an anti-religion and anti-value at her time, is now praised for as the liberal rights of human being.
Her publications are:
Founded the journal of Mother Earth in1906.
Anarchism and Other Essays. New York: Mother Earth Publishing Association, 1910.
The Social Significance of the Modern Drama. Boston: Gorham Press, 1914.
My Disillusionment in Russia. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page and Co., 1923.
My Further Disillusionment in Russia. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page and Co., 1924.
Living My Life. New York: Knopf, 1931.
Voltairine de Cleyre. Berkeley Heights, N.J.: Oriole Press, 1932.
The Social Significance of the Modern Drama. Boston: Gorham Press, 1914.
My Disillusionment in Russia. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page and Co., 1923.
My Further Disillusionment in Russia. Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page and Co., 1924.
Living My Life. New York: Knopf, 1931.
Voltairine de Cleyre. Berkeley Heights, N.J.: Oriole Press, 1932.
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