Overview

Born in 1901, Louise Thompson Patterson was a leading and transformative figure in radical African American politics. Throughout most of the twentieth century she embodied a dedicated resistance to racial, economic, and gender exploitation. In this, the first biography of Patterson, Keith Gilyard tells her compelling story, from her childhood on the West Coast, where she suffered isolation and persecution, to her participation in the Harlem Renaissance and beyond. In the 1930s and 1940s she became central, along with Paul Robeson, to the labor movement, and later, in the 1950s, she steered proto-black-feminist activities. Patterson was also crucial to the efforts in the 1970s to free political prisoners, most notably Angela Davis. In the 1980s and 1990s she continued to work as a progressive activist and public intellectual. To read her story is to witness the courage, sacrifice, vision, and discipline of someone who spent decades working to achieve justice and liberation for all.

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9780822369929

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Reviews

Bravo! Another elegant, inspiring, and complex chapter in the history of Black radical internationalism has been written. And not surprisingly, the brazen intellectual and organizer at the center of the story is a woman. In this case that woman is the passionate, persistent, and worldly Louise Thompson Patterson. Professor Gilyard has given us a great narrative gift in this thoroughly researched and powerfully written biography of such an important figure in Black left history. -- Barbara Ransby, author of Eslanda: The Large and Unconventional Life of Mrs. Paul Robeson The incredible story of Louise Thompson Patterson needed to be told, and Keith Gilyard delivered. A beautiful, dynamic account of one of the most dangerous, courageous and brilliant women of the twentieth century, this work tracks Thompson Patterson into the very epicenter US and international radical art, culture, and insurgent movements. Wherever she went-Harlem or Chicago, Berkeley or Birmingham, Moscow or Madrid-eruptions inevitably followed. -- Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists during the Great Depression

Bravo! Another elegant, inspiring and complex chapter in the history of Black radical internationalism has been written. And not surprisingly, the brazen intellectual and organizer at the center of the story is a woman. In this case that woman is the passionate, persistent, and worldly Louise Thompson Patterson. Professor Gilyard has given us a great narrative gift in this thoroughly researched and powerfully written biography of such an important figure in Black left history. --Barbara Ransby, author of Eslanda: The Large and Unconventional Life of Mrs. Paul Robeson

Author Information

Keith Gilyard is Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English and African American Studies at Pennsylvania State University and the author and editor of numerous books, including True to the Language Game: African American Discourse, Cultural Politics, and Pedagogy and John Oliver Killens: A Life of Black Literary Activism.

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