Helen Keller: Rebel Lives

This unique book presents a generally unrecognized aspect of Helen Keller’s life: her radical socialism, her defense of the IWW and her pacifist stance during both world wars. It includes texts written about her, by figures such as socialist leader Eugene V. Debs and Mark Twain.

"Her liberal views and wide sympathies ought to shame those who have physical eyes, yet do not open them to the sorrows that encompass the mass of men."—New York Call (1911)

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"We were born into an unjust system. We are not prepared to grow old in it."—Bernadette Devlin

Rebel Lives books feature writings both by and about individuals who have played significant roles in humanity’s ongoing fight for a better world. The series shows the not-so-well-recognized political views of some well-known figures and introduces some not-so-famous rebels. Strongly representative of race, class and gender, these books are smaller format, inexpensive, accessible and provocative.

Let us try revolution! - Helen Keller, suffragist, socialist, champion of the poor

KLIATT

One might not expect to find a little book on Helen Keller in a series called Rebel Lives, but rebel she certainly was, at least in the early years of her public career. In his introduction, the editor vigorously challenges the generally held image of the "poor little blind girl," the often-seen child of William Gibson's The Miracle Worker, the heroic victim/sufferer frequently portrayed in literature for young readers. Helen Keller was an avowed socialist, a member of the IWW, a suffragette, a supporter of Eugene Debs and a denouncer of American involvement in WW I. This text presents excerpts from her writings ranging from a 1901 article in the Ladies Home Journal in which she blames the social system for blindness in newborns, through a 1932 Atlantic Monthly article, "Put Your Husband in the Kitchen," and a 1944 appearance before the House Committee on Labor. Keller's vehement defense of her socialist beliefs defies her critics who claim she had been duped (by her teacher Anne Sullivan Macy's husband) or brainwashed. While the activities of her later life were focused on causes related to the education of the deaf and the blind, these early texts reveal to the reader a little-known aspect of Helen Keller's life. (Rebel Lives). KLIATT Codes: SA;Recommended for senior high school students, advanced students, and adults. 2003,, Ocean Press, 88p., Moore

John Davis is an Irish writer and historian specialising in US radical history.