About this title: The highly respected educator and community activist tells of his days in the late 1960s when he founded the militant activist group the Weather Underground, and his involvement in the defining moments of his generation.
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Description: Very Good. Former Library book. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Like New. Book in almost Brand New condition. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Acceptable. Some damage to the cover but integrity still intact, binding slightly damaged but integrity still intact, possible writing in margins, possible underlining and highlighting of text. read more
Description: Good. Minimal damage to the cover, dust jacket not necessarily included minimal wear to binding, majority of pages undamaged, minimal to no highlighting/underlining of text, no missing p. read more
Description: Very good. Very minimal damage to the cover (no holes or tears, only minimal scuff marks), in some instances dust jackets are not included, no missing pages, minimal to no highlighting/under. read more
Description: Fine. 0807032778 Like new! ! Minor cover wear. Buy with confidence, Tracking information provided for all orders. Orders over $49.99 will receive an upgrade from standard to priority mail. Customer satisfaction guaranteed! ! read more
Binding: Softcover
Publisher: Beacon Pr
Date Published: 2009-01-12
ISBN-13:9780807032770ISBN:0807032778
Description: NEW. Softcover. From an inventory that is 100% brand-new, 100% direct from the publishers' distribution channel. We carry NO pre-owned, NO remaindered. We pack in CARDBOARD to ensure the pristine quality is maintained. (Bubble-wrap alone is NOT sufficient to protect from USPS equipment. ) Guaranteed brand-NEW, protected with CARDBOARD, your satisfaction is guaranteed. BKLUVID: 9780807032770. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Date Published: 2009
ISBN-13:9780807032770ISBN:0807032778
Description: New. The highly respected educator and community activist tells of his days in the late 1960s when he founded the militant activist group the Weather Underground, and his involvement in the defining moments of his generation. read more
"This book is a little clunky, and Bill Ayers is not a fantastic writer. This story, however, is far more important than as a first-person historical relic of the SDS and Weatherman in the days after the house on 11th Street evaporated. It is about bringing the war home, and it is about a war that continues today. I bought it at a reading several years ago and only broke it out last fall when the Ayers connection became an issue in the Obama campaign. Venceremos!"
"Ayers is a good writer. The book recreates the 60's well. Ayers captures his memories of the period. I like the way he interweaves definitions of "memory" throughout the book-the definitions are a subtle reminder that the book is his impressions, his point of view, his memories which are mutable. A central concern is the death of three of his friends--one of whom was his lover--while they were constructing a bomb. He keeps circling around this event. I did not feel he was trying to convince readers to agree with his views. In the end, while I sympathize with his efforts to get the government to pay attention and end the Viet Nam war, I do not agree with the methods Ayers and the Weathermen choose to push their agenda."
"What does one do when one's eyes are opened to injustice? How does one respond to authority when that authority is responsible for repression, oppression and death and does these things in your name?
These are some of the fundamental questions that are as relevant today as they were when Bill Ayers answered them by joining movements for racial justice in the 1960s. He eventually became and anti-war activist and helped carry out five bombings of government buildings during the Viet Nam era at a time when more than 5,000 protest bombings from groups and individuals of all kinds took place in a single year in the U.S. Three of his comrades, including his lover and best friend, died when one of the bombs they were making accidentally exploded.
Bill came to campus a couple of weeks ago. I started to read his memoir before his visit. And before that I watched a two hour interview with him and his wife, Bernardine Dohrn, on Democracy Now! His two talks were inspiring. What I remembered most from them and his memoir is his advice to educate yourself about what's going on, to act on that knowledge and then to doubt your actions, act again, doubt, get more information, act, doubt, etc.
I want to be moral in my actions against immorality. It's a difficult position. Though I have never bombed any property, I have broken off the tips of lead pencils in the locks of doors of professors who have harassed women friends and left threatening notes under their doors to cut it out. I have publicly humiliated officials with my words when they have voted differently than I thought they should have. I don't do these things anymore.
I have been arrested twice for planned civil disobedience and have accepted the consequences willingly. I would do this again for it is open, honest and entirely peaceful.
The means are the end. I believe that and try to live that. I don't believe that anything good can come from force, whether that's force against a repressive government or force against a lover with words said during an argument. I think, I act, I doubt. And repeat. Bill did the same in a different context with different means and a different sacrifice. He does a brilliant job in his book of illuminating that context and that era and the work that's left to be done. Do anything, he says, and try to win over others. There are many ways to do that. No one way is the only way."
"Hmm. The beginning starts out concrete and interesting, but the book quickly delves into the abstract. Ayers claims he must be vague for legality's sake, but it makes for a lame book where the narrator's decisions don't make sense..."
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