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BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY
- University of Arkansas Press
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BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY In Panther lore, there are many voices. Among the first of these voices were those who lived in and survived the party and the turbulent times that spawned it. Huey Newton’s Revolutionary Suicide and To Die for the People give readers an up close and personal glimpse into the life and motivations of one of its founders. Cofounder Bobby Seale’s Seize the Time remains the standard volume on the party’s early years and its development into a national phenomenon. Former chairwoman Elaine Brown’s controversial A Taste of Power uncovers much of the internal violence that permeated the group and also showed how gender dynamics contributed to the party’s stifling growth. Eldridge Cleaver’s PostPrison Writings give us a glimpse into the mind of this once-respected radical. Chief of staff David Hilliard’s This Side of Glory is a masterfully written piece of history that pulls the curtain back on the party’s radical period and provides a glimpse into the decision-making apparatus that later ensured the party’s demise after only sixteen years. Other rank-and-file members have tried their hand at writing history. Earl Anthony did so as early as 1972, with his Spitting in the Wind. Anthony exposed the party’s weak underbelly when he wrote about its leaders’ shortcomings and criminal proclivities. Bill Brent’s Long Time Gone and Assata Shakur’s Assata: An Autobiography provide much-needed insight into the inner workings of the group and individual interpretations of how one grows and evolves in an organization. Both these texts describe how their authors fled to Cuba due to their trouble with the law. Shakur’s flight can be viewed as the more noble of the two, as she continues to resist in Cuba today. Fred Hampton’s former fiancé Akua Njeri’s My Life With the Black Panther Party demonstrates that the party swam or sunk based on the rank-and-file’s impression of local leaders. All these works provide a view of the party that is otherwise unavailable. Dhoruba Bin Wahad’s Still Black Still Strong is a piercing view of the movement in the Northeast and its international implications. Most recently, Evans Daryl Hopkins’s Life After Life: A Story of Rage and Redemption, chronicles the life of a southern black man whose revolutionary dreams often stood at odds with his sobering realities. Hopkins describes his journey from 397 country bumpkin to urban revolutionary to prison inmate to prolific writer. His is a story of trial and triumph, perseverance and faith in oneself and one’s dreams. The guideposts these works provide are invaluable to understanding the party as a whole. Other Panthers who weighed in on one of the 1960s’ most exciting groups include Mumia Abu Jamal, a Philadelphia radio personality and news reporter currently incarcerated for his alleged role in the killing of a Philadelphia police officer. Jamal has recently been the beneficiary of worldwide demonstrations to get him released. He has effectively become the poster child for political prisoners in the United States. His most recent book, We Want Freedom: My Life in the Party, offers an eye-opening analysis of the principles the Panthers stood for. His chapter on women in the party is arguably the best written to date. Jamal wrote this treatise while awaiting execution on Pennsylvania’s death row. Geronimo (Ji Jaga) Pratt wrote of his life growing up in Louisiana, going to Vietnam, then joining the Black Panther Party’s Los Angeles chapter, where he became responsible for preparing all offices for self-defense. His treatment of the party in Last Man Standing focuses on his illegal incarceration for the murder of Caroline Olsen, a Santa Monica school teacher. Pratt provides vivid details about life on death row in California prisons and his legal battles over a twenty-seven-year period. His lawyer, the late Johnnie Cochran, finally convinced a judge of his innocence and he emerged from jail in 1998. George Jackson’s Soledad Brother and Blood in My Eye remain the standard works on revolutionary prison literature. Both these books offer an incisive critique of prison life and the revolutionary’s role behind bars. They offer the best examination of the history of black political prisoners inside the United States. In a near-slanderous critique of the party, Hugh Pearson’s Shadow of the Panther has done more to give the party a black eye than the federal government in the group...