"THE ARTIST MUST ELECT TO FIGHT FOR FREEDOM OR FOR SLAVERY. I HAVE MADE MY CHOICE. THERE IS NO ALTERNATIVE": VERY SCARCE LIMITED FIRST EDITION OF PEEKSKILL USA, 1951, ONE OF ONLY 500 COPIES SIGNED BY PAUL ROBESON, HOWARD FAST AND WILLIAM PATERSON
(ROBESON, Paul) (PATERSON, William) FAST, Howard. Peekskill: USA a personal experience. (United States of America): Civil Rights Congress, (1951). Octavo, original brown cloth, original dust jacket.
Limited first edition, number 67 of only 500 specially-bound copies signed on half title by Paul Robeson, author Howard Fast and William L. Paterson, Executive Secretary of the Civil Rights Congress, additionally inscribed by Paterson, "We will win with unity here is the proof," featuring eight pages of illustrations documenting attacks on Robeson and others at Peekskill, in the original dust jacket.
Robeson, whose landmark role in Emperor Jones drew high praise as one of the era's "most thoroughly eloquent" performances," reprised the role in England, followed another performance on the London stage of "Ol' Man River" in his role as Joe in Show Boat, and his ground-breaking lead in Othello—one of his most "spectacular successes" (New York Times). Robeson continued to live mostly abroad in the 1930s, traveling across Europe and into Russia. In 1938 he declared, while speaking out against fascism in the Spanish Civil War: "The artist must elect to fight for freedom or for slavery. I have made my choice: I had no alternative" (Buhle, Encyclopedia of the American Left, 655). In 1949, when it was announced that a Robeson concert would be held near Peekskill, the American Legion, Chamber of Commerce and a Joint Veterans' Council urged protesters to demonstrate against him. On the way there, Robeson and concertgoers faced violent mobs who blocked the road, threw rocks and bottles, and "moved from car to car, yanking passengers out to be met by screams of 'Dirty Commie' and 'Dirty kike'… Police were visible on the sidelines, some smiling, none making a move to interfere." Before Robeson reached the concert grounds, rioters set fire to the stage and he was rushed back to New York City (Buhle, 365-67).
At the meeting in Harlem, called by the Emergency Committee to Protest the Peekskill Riot, "Robeson spoke to the crowd of over 3,000, declaring: 'I will be loyal to the America of the true traditions: to the America of the abolitionists, of Harriet Tubman, of Thaddeus Stevens, of those who fought for my people's freedom, not of those who tried to enslave them.'" When he announced he would give a rescheduled concert on September near Peekskill, supporters confronted effigies of him hanged near the concert ground. As 20,000 concertgoers arrived, protesters marched, shouting antisemitic and racist threats. Nevertheless, a defiant Robeson stepped on the stage after the introductory concert by Pete Seeger. Robeson opened with "Let My People Go" and 'brought the crowd to its feet with a rendition of "Ol' Man River," that emphasized his earlier change in lyrics: 'I must keep fightin' until I'm dyin.'" After the concert he barely escaped the mobs and was swiftly "taken out in a convoy of cars… [As] the national debate on Peekskill raged for many months, Mississippi Representative John Rankin shouted on the floor of Congress: "'If that N—Robeson does not like this country, let him go to Russia.'" Targeted by the FBI, CIA and Department of State for decades, blacklisted with his passport revoked in the 1950s, Robeson died in January 1976, after a decade of ill health. At the news, Coretta Scott King "deplored 'America's inexcusable treatment' of a man who had had 'the courage to point out her injustices'" (Duberman, Paul Robeson, 367-370, 549). At his funeral in Harlem, he was eulogized as a man who "tried to live 'with dignity' and… 'bore on his body marks of vengeance'" (Buhle, 655, 550). Signed limited first edition: inked limitation number "67" to lower corner of initial blank leaf. Authored by noted historian and novelist Howard Fast. this is one of only 500 specially-bound copies signed on the lined half-title by Paul Robeson and Howard Fast, along with an inscription by William L. Patterson, Executive Secretary of the Civil Rights Congress. Patterson wrote the work's introduction and was key in organizing the concert. Patterson's inscription, above his signature, reads: "We will win with unity Here is the proof." Dedicated to Paul Robeson; with preface and text by Howard Fast.
Book fine; light edge-wear, mild toning to very scarce near-fine dust jacket.