One of the great autobiographies in revolutionary literature, Alexander Berkman’s political coming-of-age memoirs of his prison experience in the Western Penitentiary of Pennsylvania. Held from 1892 until his release in 1906 for the attempted assassination of capitalist Henry Clay Frick, this work was first published in 1912. Of note is Berkman’s early descriptions of gay sex and love, virtually absent from left literature until recently.

Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist by Alexander Berkman. Mother Earth Publishing Association, New York. 1912.

Contents: Introduction, I) THE AWAKENING AND ITS TOLL, The Call of Homestead, The Seat of War, The Spirit of Pittsburgh, The Attentat, The Third Degree, The Jail, The Trial, II) THE PENITENTIARY, Desperate Thoughts, The Will to Live, Spectral Silence, A Ray of Light, The Shop, My First Letter, Wingie, To the Girl, Persecution, The Yegg, The Route Sub Rosa, Zuchhausbluethen, The Judas, The Dip, The Urge of Sex, The Warden’s Threat, The “Basket” Cell, Solitary, Memory-Guests, A Day in the Cell-House, The Deeds of the Good to the Evil, The Grist of the Prison-Mill, The Scales of Justice, Thoughts that Stole Out of Prison, How Shall the Depths Cry?, Hiding the Evidence, Whitewashed Again, ‘And by All Forgot We Rot and Rot’, The Deviousness of Reform Law Applied, The Tunnel, The Death of Dick, An Alliance With the Birds, The Underground, Anxious Days, How Men Their Brothers Maim, A New Plan of Escape, Done to Death, The Shock at Buffalo, Marred Live, ‘Passing the Love of Woman’, Love’s Daring, The Bloom of ‘The Barren Staff’, A Child’s Heart-Hunger, Chum, Last Days, III) THE WORKHOUSE, IV) THE RESURRECTION. 501 pages illustrated.

PDF of book: https://archive.org/download/prisonmemoirsofa00berk/prisonmemoirsofa00berk.pdf