Benjamin Lay’s remarkable life story can be a lesson in courage and hope for us all.Fearless Benjamin tells the story of a courageous little person, only four feet tall, who fought slavery at a time when almost everyone else accepted it. A shepherd, a sailor, and a Quaker, Benjamin Lay insisted that all people, of all nations and races around the world, were equal. Every human being—rich and poor, men and women, Black and white—deserved respect, love, and freedom. After he...

Featuring an African American fugitive from bondage, an undercover woman, and ‘outcasts of all nations,’ an arresting graphic exploration of the resistance and radical vision of 18th-century piratesA tale of mutiny, bloody battle, and social revolution, Under the Banner of King Death novelizes for the first time the real pirates, an itinerant community of outsiders, behind our legends. This graphic novel breaks new ground in our understanding of piracy and...

In 1972 Selma James set out a new political perspective. Her starting point was the millions of unwaged women who, working in the home and on the land, were not seen as “workers” and their struggles viewed as outside of the class struggle. Based on her political training in the Johnson-Forest Tendency, founded by her late husband C.L.R. James, on movement experience South and North, and on a respectful study of Marx, she redefined the working class to include sectors previously dismissed a...

In a chilling exploration of a nearly forgotten chapter of history, Marcus Rediker delves into the dark depths of slave ships in the 18th century.In this widely praised history of an infamous institution, award-winning scholar Marcus Rediker shines a light into the darkest corners of the British and American slave ships of the eighteenth century. With meticulous detail, Rediker uncovers the harsh realities of the slave trade, shedding light on the inhumane treatmen...

**Winner of the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award · Shortlisted for the Museum of African American History Stone Book Award · A Library Journal Best History Book of the YearA definitive, sweeping account of the Underground Railroad’s long-overlooked maritime origins, from a pre-eminent scholar of Atlantic history and the award-winning author of The Slave Ship**As many as 100,000 enslaved people fled successfully from the horrors of bondage in the antebellu...

The little-known story of an eighteenth-century Quaker dwarf who fiercely attacked slavery and imagined a new, more humane way of lifeIn The Fearless Benjamin Lay, renowned historian Marcus Rediker chronicles the transatlantic life and times of a singular man—a Quaker dwarf who demanded the total, unconditional emancipation of all enslaved Africans around the world. Mocked and scorned by his contemporaries, Lay was unflinching in his opposition to slavery,...

**"Vividly drawn . . . this stunning book honors the achievement of the captive Africans who fought for—and won—their freedom.”—The Philadelphia TribuneA unique account of the most successful slave rebellion in American history, now updated with a new epilogue—from the award-winning author of The Slave Ship**In this powerful and highly original account, Marcus Rediker reclaims the Amistad rebellion for its true proponents: the enslaved Africans wh...

Villains of All Nations explores the 'Golden Age' of Atlantic piracy (1716-1726) and the infamous generation whose images underlie our modern, romanticized view of pirates.Rediker introduces us to the dreaded black flag, the Jolly Roger; swashbuckling figures such as Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard; and the unnamed, unlimbed pirate who was likely Robert Louis Stevenson's model for Long John Silver in Treasure Island.This history shows from the bottom up ho...

As the Egyptian revolution gained momentum in the winter of 2011, a common refrain echoed across Cairo’s Tahrir Square: “The wall of fear came down!” Mass protests against fear and authoritarianism have also rumbled across the aggrieved streets and plazas of Tunis, Athens, Madrid, New York City, Istanbul, Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City, Delhi, and beyond. While the scale of these new uprisings may be unprecedented, the refusal of fear is not unique to our time.Nothing to Lose but ...

A stunning graphic history of how enslaved Africans on board the Amistad rebelled and captured the slave ship in 1839, challenging a whitewashed version of history and putting the Africans back at the center of their own freedom storyFrom the trio of Rediker, Lester, and Buhle comes another graphic "history from below" about the Amistad rebellion of 1839 when 53 enslaved Africans on the slave ship Amistad slipped out of their restraints a...

Winner of the International Labor History AwardLong before the American Revolution and the Declaration of the Rights of Man, a motley crew of sailors, slaves, pirates, laborers, market women, and indentured servants had ideas about freedom and equality that would forever change history. The Many Headed-Hydra recounts their stories in a sweeping history of the role of the dispossessed in the making of the modern world.When an unprecedented expansion of trade and colonization...

This maritime history "from below" exposes the history-making power of common sailors, slaves, pirates, and other outlaws at sea in the era of the tall ship.In Outlaws of the Atlantic, award-winning historian Marcus Rediker turns maritime history upside down. He explores the dramatic world of maritime adventure, not from the perspective of admirals, merchants, and nation-states but from the viewpoint of commoners—sailors, slaves, indentured servants, pirat...