by [compiled by] John Langston Gwaltney (1986)
Twenty-seven remarkable people talk about their personal experiences of dissent, the battles they have fought, and they discuss what made them dissenters.
edited and introduced by Paul Auster
In 1999, Paul Auster and National Public Radio's Weekend All Things Considered programme asked listeners to send in true stories, to be read on-air as part of the National Story Project. The response was overwhelming : everyone, it seemed, had a story to tell. *True Tales of American Life* gathers 180 of these stories in one extraordinary volume.
as told by Michael Hittman
This is the compelling yet disturbing story of Corbett Mack (1892-1974), an opiate addict who was a member of the Nuumuu (Numa), or Northern Paiute. The Northern Paiute are best known as the people who produced Wovoka, the Ghost Dance prophet whose revitalistic teachings swept the Indian world in the 1890s. Mack is from the generation following the collapse of the Ghost Dance religion, a generation of Nomogweta or "half breeds" (also called "stolen children") - Paiute of mixed ancestry who were raised in an increasingly bicultural world and who fell into virtual peonage to white (often Italian) potato farmers. Around the turn of the century, the use of opium became widespread among the Paiute, adopted from equally victimized Chinese laborers with whom they worked closely in the fields. The story of Corbett Mack is an uncompromising account of a harsh and sometimes traumatic life that was typical of an entire generation of Paiute. It was a life born out of the turmoil and humiliation of an Indian boarding school, troubled by opiate addiction, bound to constant labor in the fields, yet nonetheless made meaningful through the perseverance of Paiute cultural traditions.
Sharon Hom and Stacy Mosher
"Challenging China brings together the voices of Chinese reporters, intellectuals, activists, and poets; their moving personal stories, memoirs, analyses, and reportage open a window into the struggle of people in China to speak out, to witness, to demand an accounting from those in power, and to look deeply and honestly at their country's problems."--Jacket.
Marie Cardinal
Une femme seule, quelque part dans le midi. Elle rêve à l'Algérie son pays natal perdu il y a longtemps. Elle revoit le port, le quai, le bateau sur lequel elle a embarqué, un bébé dans les bras, sans savoir qu'elle ne reviendrait plus jamais au pays de son enfance. Au fur et à mesure que se déroule la vie quotidienne de la narratrice éclatent à la surface de sa conscience des bulles de souvenirs. Telle la scène, bouleversante, de la mort du père. Elle a quatorze ans et connaît peu cet homme avec qui elle ne vivait pas. Au pied du cercueil où il repose, d'étranges pensées l'assaillent : est-il nu dans sa boîte? Quel homme, désormais pourrait lui donner autant d'amour qu'un père? ... Mais les échappées oniriques de la narratrice ne se bornent pas à l'enfance. D'autres scènes, d'autres hommes viennent la visiter sous sa tonnelle. -- Back cover.