- Emma (play)
Emma (or Emma: A Play in Two Acts about Emma Goldman, American Anarchist, its full title) is a play by historian and playwright
Howard Zinn . It was first performed in 1976.The play dramatizes events from the life of the real
Emma Goldman . Zinn wrote the play using Goldman's autobiography, correspondence between Goldman and fellow anarchistAlexander Berkman (Emma's lover, who also became a character in the play), and other research. [cite book|author = Howard Zinn|title = Emma |edition = 2002|publisher = South End Press|url = http://books.google.com/books?id=mxZ1Ty6q1GEC]According to author Tom H. Hastings, the play shows the period of Goldman's "
nonviolence and resistance tomilitarism ", rather than her earlier "attachment to violent revolution". After someone accuses her of plotting to "blow up the fleet" inSan Francisco harbor, she declares "Bombs are not my way", but she "would be happy to see the fleet sink to the bottom of the sea ... so that we, and our brothers and sisters in other countries, can live in peace." [cite book
title=Nonviolent Response to Terrorism
author=Tom H. Hastings
year=2004
publisher=McFarland & Company
isbn=0786418745]Plot summary
The action of the play takes place during the late 1880s, and focuses on the character of Emma Goldman as she grows from a simple textile factory worker to a revolutionary and anarchist. The outspoken advocacy of radical anarchist and populist ideals are followed through persecution and hardship to the beginnings of
World War I . [cite web|url=http://theater2.nytimes.com/mem/theater/treview.html?res=9A0DE0D9113CF934A25751C0A960948260 |title = STAGE: 'EMMA,' HOWARD ZINN'S TALE OF RADICALS |accessdate = 2008-01-14 |publisher = New York Times |date = 1986-02-17 |author = Walter Goodman] The play closes with the words of Goldman during an anti-conscription protest in 1917, just before her arrest onsedition charges. [cite news
url=http://www.dawn.com/weekly/books/archive/030518/books12.htm
title=Review: A woman in revolt
author=Karamatullah K. Ghori
date= 2003-05-18
publisher=Dawn (newspaper)
accessdate=2008-01-15]Resources
External links
* [http://howardzinn.org Howard Zinn's Website]
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