3 Review(s)

"‘The authors skillfully blend a thorough grasp of the first half of the century with a sensitive use of psycho-biographical technique.’—GADDIS SMITH (YALE), Foreign AffairsAgnes Smedley’s (1894–1950) career as an activist journalist began in the 1910s and 1920s, with a commitment to the Indian Independence movement. Her anti-imperialism was based on the Jeffersonian tradition of the American Revolution. In New York, she was close to the Lion of the Punjab, Lala Lajpat Rai, writing for his publications until his death. In California, she was involved with the Sikh-led Ghadar party of insurrectionists. Her complicated relationship with the European movement leader Virendranath Chattopadhyaya in Berlin in the 1920s is better known. Smedley left Europe for China in 1929 in an effort to reach India through the backdoor.Once in China, she was struck by the poverty and oppression of ordinary people. Her new cause, in addition to anti-imperialism, became the Chinese peasant. For the next two decades she documented their plight in countless publications (including in the Indian press). Herself the product of rural poverty, she identified like few Westerners did with the plight of peasants, Chinese or Indian, and wrote biographies of Chinese peasant leaders such as Zhu De. Today, inside and outside of Asia, Smedley is recognized as a feminist icon and one of the most important chroniclers of the Chinese Revolution. Her story is told here for the first time in an Indian edition, including her deep involvement with the Indian independence movement much before Gandhi appeared on the scene.‘A first-rate biography – rich in detail, lucid in expression and judicious in interpretation.’—JOHN PATRICK DIGGINS, New York Times Book Review‘In Agnes Smedley, the MacKinnons have found an unusual American woman whose private odyssey was every bit as fascinating as her public one; whose refusal to accept the world political status quo was mirrored by her refusal to accept the status quo of male-female relationships… Janice and Stephen MacKinnon have written a painstakingly researched and truly riveting account of this unique American journalist.’—ORVILLE SCHELL, The Nation‘[The authors’] access to original Chinese material and to Smedley’s personal correspondence immeasurably enriches our knowledge of a true American original. In presenting Agnes Smedley, the authors also afford us a panoramic view of the Chinese history she witnessed and the social climate in which she lived.’—ANITA SUSAN GROSSMAN, San Francisco Chronicle‘In this splendid biography—Smedley emerges as an intense, passionately committed radical—with all of the martyrdom and vision of the medieval saints… Her life story, skillfully reconstructed and interpreted in this first biography, makes compelling reading.’—JOYCE ANTLER, Los Angeles Times‘[A] fascinating biography… Smedley remains one of the extraordinary women of the century.’—JONATHAN MIRSKY, London Independent"