Books: Fiction

Haymarket: A Novel

Book — Fiction. By Martin Duberman. 2005. 330 pages.
Historical novel for high school and adults on the Haymarket struggle.

Time Periods: 19th Century, 1865
Themes: Labor, Organizing

9781583226711This moving work of historical fiction makes working-class life and organizing come alive up to and after the Haymarket incident in Chicago on May 4, 1886. The detail and drama of the struggle for an eight-hour work day, as seen through the lives of labor activists Lucy and Albert Parsons, hold the reader’s attention. While many know of the bomb that went off at the rally at Haymarket and the subsequent execution of labor leaders, few know of the tireless organizing, the repression, and the love that went into that heroic struggle. The author deftly weaves in racial and gender issues as well. This book should be read by all who wish to understand and feel what working-class struggle was like in the 1880s.

ISBN: 9781583226711 | Seven Stories Press