Debs: His Life, Writings and Speeches, with a Department of Appreciations

Debs, Eugene V. (Eugene Victor), 1855-1926Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.5
Word count
1M words
Chapters
100

Tags

English Originals General BiographyPolitics Labor MovementSocial ObservationPortrait GalleryLegendary LivesPolitical ActivistPower GameLife PhilosophyCivic AwarenessSocial CritiqueSpeech Collection

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Debs: His Life, Writings and Speeches, with a Department of Appreciations by DebsAuthor: Debs, Eugene V. (Eugene Victor), 1855-1926,Language: English, Class: HX: Social sciences: Socialism, Communism, Anarchism, Release Date: Mar 22, 2019

Editor's review

This book centers on the life, writings, and speeches of Eugene V. Debs, with a section of appreciations by related figures, and is a public-domain compilation of documents on socialism and the labor movement. Its value lies in presenting Debs as an orator and disseminator of ideas through primary texts and observations by his contemporaries, allowing readers to understand the context of the American labor movement and social thought from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. The book includes speeches and articles whose language carries the distinct polemical flavor of the era, making it suitable as supplementary reading for history and the history of political thought. It is best read as a documentary anthology rather than a complete biography, focusing on the expression of the texts themselves and their historical background, without expecting the systematic analysis of a modern academic monograph. Overall it suits readers interested in labor history, the history of socialist thought, and oratorical texts.

Who it's for

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Reading tips

  1. Read the biographical section first to establish a timeline, then the speeches and articles.
  2. When reading speeches, pay attention to the historical background; a general labor history can help.
  3. Treat the appreciation section as corroborating evidence, reading it against Debs's own texts.
  4. Excerpt key points by theme, then trace the thread of his thought after finishing.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

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FAQ

Is this a complete autobiography written by Debs himself? No. This book is a compilation of biography, writings, speeches, and commentary, including Debs's own texts and appreciation-style pieces by others. It is closer to a documentary anthology suited to understanding his thought and historical context, not a systematic autobiography written entirely by himself.
Can I read it without a background in labor history? You can, but some background preparation helps. The speeches and political essays carry the polemical flavor of their era; without a basic grasp of the American labor movement from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century, comprehension will suffer. It is advisable to skim a concise labor history overview before entering the texts.
Is this book suitable for academic citation? It can serve as reading and reference material for public-domain documents, but should not be used directly as a modern scholarly edition. For research, verify original sources and edition information and cross-check against professional historical works, rather than relying on the electronic text alone.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Debs, Eugene V. (Eugene Victor), 1855-1926 Author

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) was a prominent figure in the American labor and socialist movements; public information about his early life and education is limited. Two of his works are held in this collection: Labor and Freedom: The Voice and Pen of Eugene V. Debs and Debs: His Life, Writings and Speeches, with a Department of Appreciations. The first gathers his articles and speeches on labor rights, freedom, and social justice; the second combines biographical accounts, writings, speeches, and assessments by others, presenting his thought and public activity. Both books consist mainly of political essays and speeches, written in a direct, forceful, and inspiring style that reflects the debates over labor issues in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They remain basic reading for understanding Debs's ideas.