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Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson
A collection of Jackson's letters from prison, Soledad Brother is an outspoken condemnation of the racism of white America and a powerful appraisal of the prison system that failed to break his spirit but eventually took his life. Jackson's letters make palpable the intense feelings of anger and rebellion that filled black men in America's prisons in the 1960s. But even removed from the social and political firestorms of the 1960s, Jackson's story still resonates for its portrait of a man taking a stand even while locked down.
368 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1970
About the author
George L. Jackson
4 books191 followersGeorge Lester Jackson was an African-American left-wing activist, Marxist, author, a member of the Black Panther Party, and co-founder of the Black Guerrilla Family. Jackson achieved fame as one of the Soledad Brothers and was later shot to death by guards in San Quentin Prison.
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August 15, 2021
The rage….the rage
At the age of 18, George Jackson was jailed for being the getaway driver in a $70 robbery. He never got out, though the gunman was released in three years. He spent the next eleven years in various California prisons and was killed in an escape attempt in 1971. This book tells us why he remained imprisoned, this book is a red-hot indictment of America at that time. And if you read it, you may ask yourself how much things have changed despite the passage of half a century and the election of a black president along the way.
George Jackson did not accept the inferiority dumped on him by white society at large or by the extremely punitive, brutal, racist prison system. Pretty much unschooled, he wised up in prison and read extensively. What appealed to him was socialism, Communism, Mao, Ho Chi-minh, Tanzania, Ghana, and Che Guevara (to name a few). And why wouldn’t they? He lay at the bottom of an oppressive system with a character or personality that didn’t kowtow easily. George Jackson was, to paraphrase James Baldwin, “not their negro”. And he paid. Yes, he paid in full. He accepted his fate while railing against it in some ways, while hoping against hope that one day he would be free of that system that had thrown him into the pits and lost the key.
What you will read in this book are his letters to his parents, a few to his younger brother (who was killed trying to kidnap a judge and free three prisoners), to a friend, to Angela Davis, and to his lawyer, a woman he trusted and liked. They are full of anger, humanity, frustration, pain, acquired knowledge, rebellion, strength, and youthful naiveté. If I had read “Soledad Brother” fifty years ago, I would have missed the last one. He mistook American racism as being somehow unique, but unfortunately the same vicious behavior exists almost everywhere. American society has not created liberty, equality, and fraternity, but which one really has? He did not understand the communist system, but, like so many older people, fell for the ideals while failing to see the reality. He longed to find a just society. I am not sure that one exists.
We lost a good man, a thinking man, a man with a human spirit when George Jackson was shot and killed. He had fallen into the hole of violence from the hard place he landed as a teenager. He was wasted. Prison warped him by its violence, its brutality, and its cynical racism. We could have saved him. Do you call what he got “justice”? I want to ask you— the readers here—do you think he was the only one? Couldn’t we do better as a society? I think we could, but it’s a long road ahead.
3 stars for the polemical style and the fact that it’s out of date in many ways. But in some ways, the same questions still stand. The emotion certainly does.
At the age of 18, George Jackson was jailed for being the getaway driver in a $70 robbery. He never got out, though the gunman was released in three years. He spent the next eleven years in various California prisons and was killed in an escape attempt in 1971. This book tells us why he remained imprisoned, this book is a red-hot indictment of America at that time. And if you read it, you may ask yourself how much things have changed despite the passage of half a century and the election of a black president along the way.
George Jackson did not accept the inferiority dumped on him by white society at large or by the extremely punitive, brutal, racist prison system. Pretty much unschooled, he wised up in prison and read extensively. What appealed to him was socialism, Communism, Mao, Ho Chi-minh, Tanzania, Ghana, and Che Guevara (to name a few). And why wouldn’t they? He lay at the bottom of an oppressive system with a character or personality that didn’t kowtow easily. George Jackson was, to paraphrase James Baldwin, “not their negro”. And he paid. Yes, he paid in full. He accepted his fate while railing against it in some ways, while hoping against hope that one day he would be free of that system that had thrown him into the pits and lost the key.
What you will read in this book are his letters to his parents, a few to his younger brother (who was killed trying to kidnap a judge and free three prisoners), to a friend, to Angela Davis, and to his lawyer, a woman he trusted and liked. They are full of anger, humanity, frustration, pain, acquired knowledge, rebellion, strength, and youthful naiveté. If I had read “Soledad Brother” fifty years ago, I would have missed the last one. He mistook American racism as being somehow unique, but unfortunately the same vicious behavior exists almost everywhere. American society has not created liberty, equality, and fraternity, but which one really has? He did not understand the communist system, but, like so many older people, fell for the ideals while failing to see the reality. He longed to find a just society. I am not sure that one exists.
We lost a good man, a thinking man, a man with a human spirit when George Jackson was shot and killed. He had fallen into the hole of violence from the hard place he landed as a teenager. He was wasted. Prison warped him by its violence, its brutality, and its cynical racism. We could have saved him. Do you call what he got “justice”? I want to ask you— the readers here—do you think he was the only one? Couldn’t we do better as a society? I think we could, but it’s a long road ahead.
3 stars for the polemical style and the fact that it’s out of date in many ways. But in some ways, the same questions still stand. The emotion certainly does.
October 4, 2011
What can I say about George. This is a troublesome one for me. George got done for robbing a petrol station in California -- a $70 heist -- and got one year to life as a sentence. He was advised to plead guilty, on the understanding that the one year part of the deal would see him out of the clink in next to no time. In fact, he spent the next decade -- his term started in 1960 -- in prison. At the time, the California penal system (is it any different now) was intensely racist, pitting blacks, aryan-brotherhood whites and Mexicans against each other deliberately, certainly by Jackson's accounts.
The book is a collection of George's letters, and while they begin several years into his incarceration, you do get a glimpse of him as he moves from disgruntled young man to serious, hardcore Maoist politics. He gives it to his parents with both rhetorical barrels, for being pawns of the system. His dad is totally brainwashed and unworthy of respect. His mum's that terrible scourge of the revolutionary: the emasculating woman.
There's a fair dollop of George going for the old patriarchal malarky of 'women are too irrational to be revolutionaries' and 'black women should stop robbing black men of their masculinity' etc.
This is certainly just of its time, I suppose.
It's interesting, however, when Angela Davis appears in the book. She appears toward the end of the book, no doubt as George writes to her following her hounding by old bonzo dog doo head Ronald Reagan, then governator of California and scourge of all things left-learning. She's a communist. And she's a feminist. And given the tenor of George's letters to her, she's had a word with him about his attitude to the sisters in the movement.
We read George's letters to his little brother -- the strange pride he feels when his brother scores with an older lady.
We get lots of George's revolutionary thought, which feels sort of ... Stalinist ... by modern standards. 'The people will control the factories and be motivated to treat each other fairly, just as they do in the USSR and Cuba' type stuff.
But he has a wonderful way of railing against God, which I found fascinating. Almost like he would, if he could, become more Old Testament than the God of the Old Testament, and kick God's arse if he could, in a suitably Old Testament way. Send a ravenous she-bear to mix things up. Or maybe just take a baseball bat to God's head. He's an angry dude.
And he does a great line in longing. He falls in love -- or maybe it's infatuation -- with his female correspondents, and is really quite poetic in his letters to them. He writes, I think, with a kind of frustrated fantasticness (not a word, I fear) that's really a pleasure to read.
And so, what do I think?
Worth a read for these things, and to really get a good gulp of the revolution as it existed in poor George's mind, and was envisaged at the time. And it's also worth reading to counter that stupid debate that says we'd lower crime rates if we'd just make prison tougher. Not really buying that old chestnut. But perhaps that's one for another time.
But it's generally an interesting book and well worth reading, I'd hazard.
The book is a collection of George's letters, and while they begin several years into his incarceration, you do get a glimpse of him as he moves from disgruntled young man to serious, hardcore Maoist politics. He gives it to his parents with both rhetorical barrels, for being pawns of the system. His dad is totally brainwashed and unworthy of respect. His mum's that terrible scourge of the revolutionary: the emasculating woman.
There's a fair dollop of George going for the old patriarchal malarky of 'women are too irrational to be revolutionaries' and 'black women should stop robbing black men of their masculinity' etc.
This is certainly just of its time, I suppose.
It's interesting, however, when Angela Davis appears in the book. She appears toward the end of the book, no doubt as George writes to her following her hounding by old bonzo dog doo head Ronald Reagan, then governator of California and scourge of all things left-learning. She's a communist. And she's a feminist. And given the tenor of George's letters to her, she's had a word with him about his attitude to the sisters in the movement.
We read George's letters to his little brother -- the strange pride he feels when his brother scores with an older lady.
We get lots of George's revolutionary thought, which feels sort of ... Stalinist ... by modern standards. 'The people will control the factories and be motivated to treat each other fairly, just as they do in the USSR and Cuba' type stuff.
But he has a wonderful way of railing against God, which I found fascinating. Almost like he would, if he could, become more Old Testament than the God of the Old Testament, and kick God's arse if he could, in a suitably Old Testament way. Send a ravenous she-bear to mix things up. Or maybe just take a baseball bat to God's head. He's an angry dude.
And he does a great line in longing. He falls in love -- or maybe it's infatuation -- with his female correspondents, and is really quite poetic in his letters to them. He writes, I think, with a kind of frustrated fantasticness (not a word, I fear) that's really a pleasure to read.
And so, what do I think?
Worth a read for these things, and to really get a good gulp of the revolution as it existed in poor George's mind, and was envisaged at the time. And it's also worth reading to counter that stupid debate that says we'd lower crime rates if we'd just make prison tougher. Not really buying that old chestnut. But perhaps that's one for another time.
But it's generally an interesting book and well worth reading, I'd hazard.
October 30, 2009
An awesome read from the mind of an intelligent man who sadly got caught up into the system of violence and crime. A man who grew up in the midst of racism and was convinced that all white people were evil and not to be trusted, and if white men in particular had the chance they would put all black men behind bars and throw away the key. Great writings by a man who had demons that he never could exorcise and in the end, sadly it cost both his life, his younger brother's life and others as well. A powerful read yet very sad.
December 8, 2016
A classic in its time, Soledad Brother is the autobiographical story of George Jackson who was arrested at 19 for stealing $70 at gunpoint from a gas station and sentenced to a one year to life in prison. In prison, he became politically aware and read widely: Mao, Lenin, Marx and joined the Black Panther party. This book talks about his self-education during years of solitary confinement and the injustice in the penal system heavily weighted against african-americans. It is a fascinating read and presaged his violent end. Having been attacked by neo-Nazis of the Aryan Nation in the Soledad Prison yard, he made an escape attempt and was killed by guards at 29 years old. He became a "cause celebre" for the radical black community. These letters are then sort of his will and testament and along with the Angela Davis and Malcolm X autobiographies provide the most poignant insights into this movement that still resonates today where some basic injustices denounced by these militants have not really changed enough (Ferguson, etc).
February 17, 2019
I want to start off by saying that my low review for this book is 90% my fault. Awhile ago I was advised by a friend much smarter than myself to never read the preface to either a biography or a work of philosophy, because it is impossible not to be influenced by the preface author’s reading of what you are about to engage with.
So I fucked up. I not only read the preface, but a lot about George Jackson prior to reading the book. The guy is remarkable, and an important revolutionary figure from both a Marxist and Black Liberation perspective. That being said you could have gotten that from his Wikipedia entry.
The lead up to his letters makes Jackson into a secular revolutionary saint. Reading his letters will break this illusion for you. The guy despised women, and while he bemoaned the plight of black people in America he certainly thought very little of many of them including those he was incarcerated with, calling many of them ‘uneducated cretins’ a lack of compassionate imagination that reads as hypocritical to put it mildly. If Jackson were alive today I have little doubt he’d be a left-wing equivalent of Candace Owens.
Should you read this book? Yes, it’s an important historical artifact, but if like me you went into it thinking you would get a deep thinker on revolution and liberation, then I would recommend going elsewhere.
So I fucked up. I not only read the preface, but a lot about George Jackson prior to reading the book. The guy is remarkable, and an important revolutionary figure from both a Marxist and Black Liberation perspective. That being said you could have gotten that from his Wikipedia entry.
The lead up to his letters makes Jackson into a secular revolutionary saint. Reading his letters will break this illusion for you. The guy despised women, and while he bemoaned the plight of black people in America he certainly thought very little of many of them including those he was incarcerated with, calling many of them ‘uneducated cretins’ a lack of compassionate imagination that reads as hypocritical to put it mildly. If Jackson were alive today I have little doubt he’d be a left-wing equivalent of Candace Owens.
Should you read this book? Yes, it’s an important historical artifact, but if like me you went into it thinking you would get a deep thinker on revolution and liberation, then I would recommend going elsewhere.
March 3, 2022
"If you could live my life one week and see the things I see, feel the pain I feel, and die a little bit each day as I do, all your illusions and apparitions would vanish."
Hard to put this book down and not feel inspired by Jackson's revolve in the face of such dire circumstances.
While many reviewers have emphasized Jackson's often uncomfortable letters to his mother regarding sexism and gender essentialisms, I was moved by Jackson's relative transformation in that realm towards the end through his letters with Angela Davis and the prominent women in his life. He even writes to Davis, "In our last communication I made a statement about women, and their part in revolutionary culture (people's war). It wasn't a clear statement. I meant to return to it but was diverted. I understand exactly what the woman's role should be. The same as the man's. Intellectually, there is little difference between male and female. The differences we see in bourgeois society are all conditioned and artificial."
Hard to put this book down and not feel inspired by Jackson's revolve in the face of such dire circumstances.
While many reviewers have emphasized Jackson's often uncomfortable letters to his mother regarding sexism and gender essentialisms, I was moved by Jackson's relative transformation in that realm towards the end through his letters with Angela Davis and the prominent women in his life. He even writes to Davis, "In our last communication I made a statement about women, and their part in revolutionary culture (people's war). It wasn't a clear statement. I meant to return to it but was diverted. I understand exactly what the woman's role should be. The same as the man's. Intellectually, there is little difference between male and female. The differences we see in bourgeois society are all conditioned and artificial."
January 7, 2013
i'm a rather big fan of george jackson. i hate to say this, but it was very hard for me to get through his letters to his parents. his views on women gave me a twitch by the time i was half way through. but then i sort of changed my perspective, cuz he wasn't writing this for publication. he is after all in jail writing his parents and all in all he has a lot to be angry about. so in a way the most offensive parts gave me a lot to think about.
his letters do become more like the writing he became famous for as they focus more on correspondence with his lawyer and other female comrades and friends (including angela davis) on the outside.
george jackson was a sincere revolutionary and for that reason i think we should all read his writings and perspective.
his letters do become more like the writing he became famous for as they focus more on correspondence with his lawyer and other female comrades and friends (including angela davis) on the outside.
george jackson was a sincere revolutionary and for that reason i think we should all read his writings and perspective.
October 29, 2008
Truly touching and great read. For those who like to look between the lines and popular views.
July 1, 2024
a weapon to be used for the revolution, and a love letter, truly
The pig is an instrument of neoslavery, to be hated and avoided; he is pushed to the front by the men who exercise the unnatural right over property. You’ve heard the patronizing shit about the thin blue line that protects property and the owners of property. The pigs are not protecting you, your home, and its contents. Recall they never found the TV set you lost in that burglary. They’re protecting the unnatural right of a few men to own the means of all of our subsistence. The pig is protecting the right of a few private individuals to own public property!! The pig is merely the gun, the tool, a mentally inanimate utensil. It is necessary to destroy the gun, but destroying the gun and sparing the hand that holds it will forever relegate us to a defensive action, hold our revolution in the doldrums, ultimately defeat us. The animal that holds the gun, that has loosed the pig of war on us, is a bitter-ender, an intractable, gluttonous vulture who must eat at our hearts to live. Midas-motivated, never satisfied, everything he touches will turn into shit! Slaying the shitty pig will have absolutely no healing effect at all, if we leave this vulture to touch someone else. Spare the hand that holds the gun and it will simply fashion another.
you can clearly see his growth over time, the first letters to his family are so simple in comparison to the later ones to his lawyers - basically essays, really. and then his love letters! so intimate and delicate.
(in the first half or so there's quite a few sexist jump-scares, but he outgrew those as well, probably thanks to meeting more amazing women.)
The pig is an instrument of neoslavery, to be hated and avoided; he is pushed to the front by the men who exercise the unnatural right over property. You’ve heard the patronizing shit about the thin blue line that protects property and the owners of property. The pigs are not protecting you, your home, and its contents. Recall they never found the TV set you lost in that burglary. They’re protecting the unnatural right of a few men to own the means of all of our subsistence. The pig is protecting the right of a few private individuals to own public property!! The pig is merely the gun, the tool, a mentally inanimate utensil. It is necessary to destroy the gun, but destroying the gun and sparing the hand that holds it will forever relegate us to a defensive action, hold our revolution in the doldrums, ultimately defeat us. The animal that holds the gun, that has loosed the pig of war on us, is a bitter-ender, an intractable, gluttonous vulture who must eat at our hearts to live. Midas-motivated, never satisfied, everything he touches will turn into shit! Slaying the shitty pig will have absolutely no healing effect at all, if we leave this vulture to touch someone else. Spare the hand that holds the gun and it will simply fashion another.
you can clearly see his growth over time, the first letters to his family are so simple in comparison to the later ones to his lawyers - basically essays, really. and then his love letters! so intimate and delicate.
(in the first half or so there's quite a few sexist jump-scares, but he outgrew those as well, probably thanks to meeting more amazing women.)
July 15, 2024
He was a product of his times and the misogyny is staggering but it’s important to note that it attenuated as his revolutionary consciousness raised
April 23, 2019
I can't remember how I found out about this book. Maybe it was mentioned in some documentary, or it was referenced by some Wikipedia article I was reading. When I marked it to read, I found that a friend had previously read it, which encouraged me to give it a try.
What a book!
First, I couldn't help hating George Jackson. The way he treated his family in his letters, the way he patronised them, how sexist he was... I was unable to empathise with him, and started thinking these were the reasons he was unable to be paroled out... and that's when it stroke me, that's when I realised how I am part of the system: eager to find reasons not to question the status quo, to find reasons to justify the systemic racism, to find reasons to bend, to fit.
At that point, I kept reading with more passion. What they did with George Jackson is a shame: he was sentenced to one year to life for a $70 armed robbery. He was told that pleading guilty would see him out of prison earlier than trying to argue his case, but instead he was kept incarcerated for 11 years, spending many of them in isolation, until he was finally killed in a riot.
George Jackson educated himself during his time in jail: he studied languages, read about Marxism, Maoism and essentially revolutionary ideology.
Learning about him from his letters is hard, since the reader lacks half of the context. Sometimes they are written after receiving a visit, sometimes they answer other letters, sometimes he's angry, sometimes he's hopeful... In the end, he learns to expect nothing.
I won't attempt to summarise his letters: he talks about politics, oppression, racism, capitalism... And his letters also talk about Martin Luther King and why his nonviolent activism could never work (this he says before MLK is murdered, and repeats afterwards)
The book is available online here: https://historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/s..., and I encourage everybody to read it.
What a book!
First, I couldn't help hating George Jackson. The way he treated his family in his letters, the way he patronised them, how sexist he was... I was unable to empathise with him, and started thinking these were the reasons he was unable to be paroled out... and that's when it stroke me, that's when I realised how I am part of the system: eager to find reasons not to question the status quo, to find reasons to justify the systemic racism, to find reasons to bend, to fit.
At that point, I kept reading with more passion. What they did with George Jackson is a shame: he was sentenced to one year to life for a $70 armed robbery. He was told that pleading guilty would see him out of prison earlier than trying to argue his case, but instead he was kept incarcerated for 11 years, spending many of them in isolation, until he was finally killed in a riot.
George Jackson educated himself during his time in jail: he studied languages, read about Marxism, Maoism and essentially revolutionary ideology.
Learning about him from his letters is hard, since the reader lacks half of the context. Sometimes they are written after receiving a visit, sometimes they answer other letters, sometimes he's angry, sometimes he's hopeful... In the end, he learns to expect nothing.
I won't attempt to summarise his letters: he talks about politics, oppression, racism, capitalism... And his letters also talk about Martin Luther King and why his nonviolent activism could never work (this he says before MLK is murdered, and repeats afterwards)
The book is available online here: https://historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/s..., and I encourage everybody to read it.
February 17, 2010
This book changed my life. Thank you, Comrade George.
July 30, 2017
Convicted at the age of 18 for stealing $70 at gunpoint from a convenience store, and sentenced to a one year to life sentence, George Jackson spent the entirety of his adult life in prison. While incarcerated, Jackson became politically conscious and his letters to family and friends began to reflect his changing views on a world that he began to see as systemically racist and violence toward black men.
What is remarkable about these letters is watching Jackson mature from a young man writing some often awkward letters to his mom and dad(there are some uncomfortably misogynistic views as well which would thankfully later evolve), into a brilliantly articulate man who sought to change the world around him.
Through these letters, we see a man who is surrounded by racism, injustice (a rolling one year to life sentence for stealing $70?!) and brutality, and yet never allows his spirit to be dragged down with it. Up until his untimely death at the age 29, he was uncompromising and unwilling to accept anything less than for total respect as a man.
Today, Jackson is perhaps not very well known. This is a shame because what he offers us in these letters is a vision of justice and hope in a world that so often seems to lack them. There are too many beautiful passages in these letters to quote them all but I’ll finish this review with one in particular that I think sums up Jackson and this wonderful collection.
“It’s pretty clear, isn’t it, what is coming. I accept it, it’s beautiful. Tomorrow.”
What is remarkable about these letters is watching Jackson mature from a young man writing some often awkward letters to his mom and dad(there are some uncomfortably misogynistic views as well which would thankfully later evolve), into a brilliantly articulate man who sought to change the world around him.
Through these letters, we see a man who is surrounded by racism, injustice (a rolling one year to life sentence for stealing $70?!) and brutality, and yet never allows his spirit to be dragged down with it. Up until his untimely death at the age 29, he was uncompromising and unwilling to accept anything less than for total respect as a man.
Today, Jackson is perhaps not very well known. This is a shame because what he offers us in these letters is a vision of justice and hope in a world that so often seems to lack them. There are too many beautiful passages in these letters to quote them all but I’ll finish this review with one in particular that I think sums up Jackson and this wonderful collection.
“It’s pretty clear, isn’t it, what is coming. I accept it, it’s beautiful. Tomorrow.”
December 2, 2011
Extremely powerful. This is a book that I think every American should read. It's an important piece of American history. Through the life of George Jackson, we see what true discipline and strength is. His words still ring in my ear as if he were speaking directly to me. Through George's letters we see what kind of struggle that Blacks had to deal with within the penal system and how a person can truly be a political prisoner.
July 4, 2012
An insightful portrait of a young, Black man during the last half of the 1960s. George Jackson's letters contain truth, hope, anger, love, bitterness - all the conflicting emotions a man in his situation knows. Though somewhat tainted my his displays of misogyny and condescension toward his mother, George Jackson's words are still valid today and should be read, specifically, by those interested in reforming the prison system.
August 1, 2012
This book shows first hand the potential that resides in a human being to elevate beyond his upbringing & circumstances. George ended up being one of the most influential people during the movement.
January 10, 2021
obra obrigatória pra qualquer um tentando se rebelar contra o capitalismo e o sistema prisional. obra artística e teórica que te prende do início ao fim; muitos sentimentos, e o principal, ódio a esse sistema que nos mata, aprisiona e nos impede de viver.
liberdade para passar fome não é verdadeira liberdade, como disse george jackson.
vida longa à george e jonathan jackson
liberdade para passar fome não é verdadeira liberdade, como disse george jackson.
vida longa à george e jonathan jackson
November 30, 2015
If blacks were to finally and effectively take their part in the capitalist quest long dominated by Europeans and recently the U.S., whom would they kidnap, subjugate, colonize or enslave to do their bidding? When blacks followed white bids for representation and equality with their own, like the Haitian Revolution following after the American and French Revolution, they were ruthlessly put down for following the obvious path of “do as I do” instead of “do as I say”. Strange that America was born by those desperately wanting of freedom, and when they got it, they denied it to others. George talks about what many are afraid to discuss: 1. Psychopaths in power wrongly mistake non-violence for weakness (because violence is what the state has a monopoly on) 2. Thus psychopaths in power won’t hear the voice of the people because they are in a position of “weakness”. 3. Therefore “Nonviolence must constantly demonstrate the implied effect of it’s opposite”; the Left must effectively pseudo re-posture itself as the tough guys. The Civil War and Reconstruction only changed black people from chattel to economic slaves and the sole reason is capitalism and George wanted it gone. When you see a black man with a fancy car, it probably is because he was wrongly taught by capitalism “we are not worth more than the amount of capital we can raise”. I like when George poetically mentions the American Flag as waving in its normal position - obstructing the sun. So why would black parents send their kids out unprepared and unprotected to be taught by an educational system, a media, and a culture that historically hates them and hates the truth? If you really liked this book, then good news - George’s Blood in My Eye is even stronger and it explains some of the stuff in the earlier Soledad Brother well. I think these books of George’s belong together, like the Hobbit with the Lord of the Rings. ☺
July 18, 2013
I've had in on my to-read forever. What better time to finally dive in than when assigned a report based on Jackson's experiences in the California prisons.
Jackson's eloquence, insight, and passion are apparent on every page. Every thoughtful penned word speaks volumes for what he experienced, what he saw, and what he was trying to communicate. And, that says a lot, when you know there must be worlds of words unsaid. And worlds of understanding lost between the lines.
Jackson's eloquence, insight, and passion are apparent on every page. Every thoughtful penned word speaks volumes for what he experienced, what he saw, and what he was trying to communicate. And, that says a lot, when you know there must be worlds of words unsaid. And worlds of understanding lost between the lines.
January 2, 2015
This book changed my life. Aside from the sexist attitude, Jackson's words are a fatal weapon to
an oppressive system.
Soledad Brother grants access to one of the greatest minds ever to pick up a pen. In a system vowed to break him, he broke though. I dare you not to be inspired or enamored with the passion and courage carried in each page.
Thank you Comrad George :)
an oppressive system.
Soledad Brother grants access to one of the greatest minds ever to pick up a pen. In a system vowed to break him, he broke though. I dare you not to be inspired or enamored with the passion and courage carried in each page.
Thank you Comrad George :)
July 26, 2008
The letters back and forth between George and his brother are a great snapshot of the period and the love of a brother for his sibling.
September 28, 2019
Remember this precious life. In a March 1967 letter to his mother, speaking on the need for revolution, he says: "I want to be in the Vanguard."
August 23, 2020
This is one of the seminal works of the Black Liberation Struggle in the United States. It stands alongside Bobby Seale’s “Seize the Time” or the works of Eldridge Cleaver. It is a series of letters written from prison by George Jackson from the mid-sixties until the death of his brother Jonathan in 1970. Jonathan was killed when he tried to take over a courtroom by force. George was killed the next year in an attempted prison breakout. At least that is the official story and I now cannot remember whether or not people believed it at the time. It does have a certain convenience to it, as did the stories of people committing suicide in apartheid prisons at the same time.
There are difficulties in reading this book 50 years after I first did so. My copy is now old and yellowing and foxed, but the punch that is delivered is still extraordinary. There can be no doubt that it is a powerful book. It was written by a man who was imprisoned as a teenager because he was involved in a store hold-up. He was given a prison sentence that effectively meant life because he could not be released until a parole board decided that it was safe to do so. I cannot imagine that a white teenager would have received such a sentence and, if he did, would not have been released within a few years. It is difficult to read this book int eh aftermath of the George Floyd killing and the Black Lives Matter campaign without being angry. It is 50 years since the events of this book and we are still in the same place.
Another difficulty is that we only have the letters that George Jackson wrote himself. We di not have the replies so we cannot see how the conversation developed and what arguments, if any, persuaded him to change his mind. At the time that the book was published, I assume that the prison authorities refused to release the replies that had been received. I expect that the letters are no longer available, but they may be in a prison library archive somewhere in California.
The most shocking thing about the book is Jackson’s incredible misogyny. He actually writes that his sister Penelope should not take part in political discussion, but should sit there quietly listening to the wisdom of her menfolk. Of course, this was written in the late sixties and he was a man of his time. This was written before the second wave of feminism began to have any influence on left-wing political thought. It is the case that when he comes into contact with women like Angela Davis and Fay Stender, his lawyer, that his views change considerably. This is one of the reasons why it is frustrating not to have the replies to his letters because we do not know why he changed his mind. We can make the assumption that their examples had a huge impact on his thinking, but we do not have the evidence.
What we do know is that when in prison he read a huge amount of political writing ranging from Che Guevara to Malcolm X. We also know that he was very aware of events taking place at the time, such as the Vietnam War. We know that he formed very clear political ideas. For instance, he was dismissive of the non-violent ideology of Martin Luther King because of the sheer scale of the violence that the racists unleashed on the Civil Rights Movement. We know that he was in awe of Ho Chi Minh and the Vietnamese people in their refusal to be defeated by the most powerful military state in the world. We know that he believed in the devastating legacy of slavery on Black Americans; how it had intimidated the men and terrorised the women. We know that he believed that the USA was a fascist state as far as black people were concerned. The fact that he spelled the name of his country Amerika, in a direct reference to the swastika, is something that cannot be overlooked.
We can also guess that if George Jackson was alive today, he would be leading the Black Lives Matter campaign. Like Joe Hill, he never died.
There are difficulties in reading this book 50 years after I first did so. My copy is now old and yellowing and foxed, but the punch that is delivered is still extraordinary. There can be no doubt that it is a powerful book. It was written by a man who was imprisoned as a teenager because he was involved in a store hold-up. He was given a prison sentence that effectively meant life because he could not be released until a parole board decided that it was safe to do so. I cannot imagine that a white teenager would have received such a sentence and, if he did, would not have been released within a few years. It is difficult to read this book int eh aftermath of the George Floyd killing and the Black Lives Matter campaign without being angry. It is 50 years since the events of this book and we are still in the same place.
Another difficulty is that we only have the letters that George Jackson wrote himself. We di not have the replies so we cannot see how the conversation developed and what arguments, if any, persuaded him to change his mind. At the time that the book was published, I assume that the prison authorities refused to release the replies that had been received. I expect that the letters are no longer available, but they may be in a prison library archive somewhere in California.
The most shocking thing about the book is Jackson’s incredible misogyny. He actually writes that his sister Penelope should not take part in political discussion, but should sit there quietly listening to the wisdom of her menfolk. Of course, this was written in the late sixties and he was a man of his time. This was written before the second wave of feminism began to have any influence on left-wing political thought. It is the case that when he comes into contact with women like Angela Davis and Fay Stender, his lawyer, that his views change considerably. This is one of the reasons why it is frustrating not to have the replies to his letters because we do not know why he changed his mind. We can make the assumption that their examples had a huge impact on his thinking, but we do not have the evidence.
What we do know is that when in prison he read a huge amount of political writing ranging from Che Guevara to Malcolm X. We also know that he was very aware of events taking place at the time, such as the Vietnam War. We know that he formed very clear political ideas. For instance, he was dismissive of the non-violent ideology of Martin Luther King because of the sheer scale of the violence that the racists unleashed on the Civil Rights Movement. We know that he was in awe of Ho Chi Minh and the Vietnamese people in their refusal to be defeated by the most powerful military state in the world. We know that he believed in the devastating legacy of slavery on Black Americans; how it had intimidated the men and terrorised the women. We know that he believed that the USA was a fascist state as far as black people were concerned. The fact that he spelled the name of his country Amerika, in a direct reference to the swastika, is something that cannot be overlooked.
We can also guess that if George Jackson was alive today, he would be leading the Black Lives Matter campaign. Like Joe Hill, he never died.
October 15, 2021
Q: Was George Jackson treated unjustly?
A: Yes, there's no question. For stealing $70 dollars at gunpoint, Jackson would spend the rest of his life in the worst of conditions, imprisoned, often in unbelievable stretches of solitary confinement.
Q: Was George Jackson admirable?
A: In some regards, absolutely. I think Jackson is a rare breed. To use his abhorrent circumstances towards his own radicalized education and action is admirable, and, from his letters, I think there are few individuals who had the single-minded grit - resilience, determination, efficacy - that Jackson demonstrated.
Q: So why the one star?
A: Although I can never claim to understand Jackson's plight as a Black revolutionary subjected to imprisonment, the letters of Soledad Brother presented nothing new to me about the corruption of American society, often were unrelated, irrelevant correspondences to peers, and, bottom-line, left me pissed off. Jackson was an open, seemingly proud, homophobe and misogynist. He makes myriad comments about the former, and take for instance the latter:
"I understand her and all black women over here. Women like to be dominated, love being strong-armed, need an overseer to supplement their weakness. So how could she really understand my feelings on self-determination. For this reason we should never allow women to express any opinions on the subject, but just to sit, listen to us, and attempt to understand. It is for them to obey and aid us, not to attempt to think." (p. 125)
Is it important we listen to the voices of the oppressed, particularly our prison population? Yes.
Do we need to make changes that Jackson sharply observes and decries? Of course.
Is this book worth reading? I can't say it is. Jackson is a polarizing, hypocritical, sometimes unbearable author, and the information and accounts presented in Soledad Brother can be read in other works that will better value your time and energy without supporting other gross social injustices.
A: Yes, there's no question. For stealing $70 dollars at gunpoint, Jackson would spend the rest of his life in the worst of conditions, imprisoned, often in unbelievable stretches of solitary confinement.
Q: Was George Jackson admirable?
A: In some regards, absolutely. I think Jackson is a rare breed. To use his abhorrent circumstances towards his own radicalized education and action is admirable, and, from his letters, I think there are few individuals who had the single-minded grit - resilience, determination, efficacy - that Jackson demonstrated.
Q: So why the one star?
A: Although I can never claim to understand Jackson's plight as a Black revolutionary subjected to imprisonment, the letters of Soledad Brother presented nothing new to me about the corruption of American society, often were unrelated, irrelevant correspondences to peers, and, bottom-line, left me pissed off. Jackson was an open, seemingly proud, homophobe and misogynist. He makes myriad comments about the former, and take for instance the latter:
"I understand her and all black women over here. Women like to be dominated, love being strong-armed, need an overseer to supplement their weakness. So how could she really understand my feelings on self-determination. For this reason we should never allow women to express any opinions on the subject, but just to sit, listen to us, and attempt to understand. It is for them to obey and aid us, not to attempt to think." (p. 125)
Is it important we listen to the voices of the oppressed, particularly our prison population? Yes.
Do we need to make changes that Jackson sharply observes and decries? Of course.
Is this book worth reading? I can't say it is. Jackson is a polarizing, hypocritical, sometimes unbearable author, and the information and accounts presented in Soledad Brother can be read in other works that will better value your time and energy without supporting other gross social injustices.
Read
July 24, 2024"Don't make me waste my time and energy winning you to a position that you should already support with all your sympathies"
This is an extremely powerful book. For some context George Jackson was a black revolutionary who was given a life sentence in prison as a teenager for stealing 70 dollars. He was radicalized in prison and these are a collection of his correspondence with his family, and friends.
His critiques of America, capitalism, and racism are extremely poignant, and maybe inflammatory enough to turn a lot of people off but he really does seem to have such a clear vision on the issues in this country. Reading about what he deals with in prison from the racist guards, to the soul crushing lack of freedom is pretty brutal and I feel it would make most readers adopt opinions closer that of prison abolitionist. He managed to still keep his fire for justice and not be completely broken down by a system trying to do just that.
One critique I have is that his views towards women in the early stages of his writings are extremely hypocritical from someone who talks so much of the struggle for freedom. From his writings they show with Angela Davis he seems to come around some later on but those letters in the book were extremely disappointing, especially since its not incredibly clear that he changed his opinions.
It was interesting to read someone who so accurately points out the contradictions in capitalism, as well as its tendency to turn people into "neoslaves" while also sapping and destroying the beauty of the world around it. There's too much interesting and great stuff in this book that I would have to write a whole book to sum up his ideas. His ending in real life is tragic but it seems that it was an ending he knew was inevitable for a black man who saw america for what it is and was willing to do something about it.
"I have surrendered all hope of happiness for myself in this life to the prospect of affecting some improvement in our circumstances as a whole. I have a plan, I will give, and give, and give of myself until it proves our making or my end."
This is an extremely powerful book. For some context George Jackson was a black revolutionary who was given a life sentence in prison as a teenager for stealing 70 dollars. He was radicalized in prison and these are a collection of his correspondence with his family, and friends.
His critiques of America, capitalism, and racism are extremely poignant, and maybe inflammatory enough to turn a lot of people off but he really does seem to have such a clear vision on the issues in this country. Reading about what he deals with in prison from the racist guards, to the soul crushing lack of freedom is pretty brutal and I feel it would make most readers adopt opinions closer that of prison abolitionist. He managed to still keep his fire for justice and not be completely broken down by a system trying to do just that.
One critique I have is that his views towards women in the early stages of his writings are extremely hypocritical from someone who talks so much of the struggle for freedom. From his writings they show with Angela Davis he seems to come around some later on but those letters in the book were extremely disappointing, especially since its not incredibly clear that he changed his opinions.
It was interesting to read someone who so accurately points out the contradictions in capitalism, as well as its tendency to turn people into "neoslaves" while also sapping and destroying the beauty of the world around it. There's too much interesting and great stuff in this book that I would have to write a whole book to sum up his ideas. His ending in real life is tragic but it seems that it was an ending he knew was inevitable for a black man who saw america for what it is and was willing to do something about it.
"I have surrendered all hope of happiness for myself in this life to the prospect of affecting some improvement in our circumstances as a whole. I have a plan, I will give, and give, and give of myself until it proves our making or my end."
April 12, 2018
A couple of months ago, on a train from San Francisco to Los Angeles, I passed Soledad Prison, which reminded me of this book.
As I noted when I began reading this, it's been on my to-read list for some time. When I discovered that it was available at archive.org, I decided to 'borrow' it. This is more a rambling collection of random thoughts than a review, I guess, but the book left me with some impressions that I wanted to share.
As the title makes clear, these are letters George Jackson wrote from prison. His attorney at the time, Fay Stender, edited and had them published, and managed to persuade French writer and political activist Jean Genet to write the introduction. A best seller, it raised substantial monies for a legal defense fund that she also set up. (More about Stender later.)
Jackson was originally convicted and imprisoned in 1961 for a $70 armed robbery, for which he was given a one-year to life sentence. The letters span the years 1964 to 1970 (he was killed the following year attempting to escape) but the book leads off with an autobiography, in the form of a letter to the book's editor, Gregory Armstrong, and a few of his more recent (1970) letters to Stender.
The earliest letters are to his parents and other relatives, many of which include the banal requests for books, typewriters, inquiries about how people are doing, etc., but also include reprimands of his parents for their weak conformity to the system. I hadn't read much by or about Jackson prior to this book, so I don't know a great deal about his relationship with his father. He is dismissive towards both of his parents at various times, but he derides his father a bit more, particularly his affection for Martin Luther King, Jr., who Jackson believed to be rather impotent in his non-violent approach. (Later in the book, his attitude towards his father seems to have improved.)
At times, I couldn't help but be reminded of Ta-Nehisi Coates' book, Between the World and Me... and I wondered if Coates had read Soledad Brother, as there was a certain similarity in both theme and political stridency. Despite having lived in very different times, the struggle of black people in the United States remains unfortunately much the same. As I recall, Coates is somewhat tethered to the Black Panther ideology, which, of course, Jackson also represented, albeit more militaristically. (Feel free to inform me on this.)
Throughout my reading of this, the fact that Jackson was in prison for a $70 robbery loomed in the back of my mind. Time after time, he was denied parole. Time after time, privileges were taken away, or he was sent to solitary confinement. I tried to imagine the abuse that he (and others in similar situations) had to endure for such a petty crime. Granted, his time in prison was extended when he was involved in an incident in which a prison guard was murdered (Jackson was charged with the murder, but was killed three days before the trial was due to commence), but as has become clearer and clearer to me each day that I have lived, our penal system is designed to abuse criminals, not reform them. Prison personnel have been given great freedoms to punish prisoners at every turn.
Late in the book is a collection of letters to his attorney, Fay Stender. These tend to be rather long, so considering that his letters were supposed to be no longer than the front and back of a standard letter-sized piece of paper, I suspect that these were handed to her during face-to-face conferences. No matter... they're quite dense with Jackson's view of the world, particularly how black people in this country have been kept down (while at the same time being expected to conform to and become one with white European constructs) which I found to be compelling and spot-on.
In some of Jackson's letters to Stender, he also makes it a point to mention his affection for her. How deeply this ran, of course, I have no clue, but I decided to do a web search to find out more... to see if there was a client-attorney relationship gone too far, to see what became of her, and to see if she was still practicing law in the Bay Area. I was disturbed to find that a member of Jackson's Black Guerrilla Family went to her home in 1979 while on parole and shot her several times in front of her children and a friend, leaving her paralyzed from the waist down. About a year later, after testifying against her attacker, she killed herself. That this happened eight years after Jackson's death was a little surprising. Considering that she was told to say that she had betrayed Jackson before being shot, I wondered if the attack might have been done at Jackson's behest; did he suggest it before he died? Or was the assailant such a rabid follower that he and other Family members took it upon themselves to punish her for not helping to acquire weapons for Jackson?
Following the letters to Stender are a collection of letters to Joan (I can't recall now if her full name was mentioned), with whom he appears to have had a quasi-romantic relationship, as well as some written to the activist Angela Davis. The letters to Davis are also peppered with words suggesting he was enamoured with her for more than just her politics, but that's conjecture. Sweetness oozed when writing to Joan, but Jackson was more philisophical with Davis, albeit with sweet sign-offs.
I found myself alternately liking Jackson and not. Mostly, I guess, I disliked his misogynistic attitude, in general, toward women, something that he disn't really show with Stender, Joan, or Davis. I wish I would have made note of his specific wording, but he clearly considered women a peg or two below men... or at least himself.
I've given this a five-start rating because I believe that it should be read by anyone wanting to understand some of the dynamics of this country's problems related to skin colour. The real substance of Jackson's militarism springs from a well-thought out view of the treatment of black people since they were first brought here as slaves.
As I noted when I began reading this, it's been on my to-read list for some time. When I discovered that it was available at archive.org, I decided to 'borrow' it. This is more a rambling collection of random thoughts than a review, I guess, but the book left me with some impressions that I wanted to share.
As the title makes clear, these are letters George Jackson wrote from prison. His attorney at the time, Fay Stender, edited and had them published, and managed to persuade French writer and political activist Jean Genet to write the introduction. A best seller, it raised substantial monies for a legal defense fund that she also set up. (More about Stender later.)
Jackson was originally convicted and imprisoned in 1961 for a $70 armed robbery, for which he was given a one-year to life sentence. The letters span the years 1964 to 1970 (he was killed the following year attempting to escape) but the book leads off with an autobiography, in the form of a letter to the book's editor, Gregory Armstrong, and a few of his more recent (1970) letters to Stender.
The earliest letters are to his parents and other relatives, many of which include the banal requests for books, typewriters, inquiries about how people are doing, etc., but also include reprimands of his parents for their weak conformity to the system. I hadn't read much by or about Jackson prior to this book, so I don't know a great deal about his relationship with his father. He is dismissive towards both of his parents at various times, but he derides his father a bit more, particularly his affection for Martin Luther King, Jr., who Jackson believed to be rather impotent in his non-violent approach. (Later in the book, his attitude towards his father seems to have improved.)
At times, I couldn't help but be reminded of Ta-Nehisi Coates' book, Between the World and Me... and I wondered if Coates had read Soledad Brother, as there was a certain similarity in both theme and political stridency. Despite having lived in very different times, the struggle of black people in the United States remains unfortunately much the same. As I recall, Coates is somewhat tethered to the Black Panther ideology, which, of course, Jackson also represented, albeit more militaristically. (Feel free to inform me on this.)
Throughout my reading of this, the fact that Jackson was in prison for a $70 robbery loomed in the back of my mind. Time after time, he was denied parole. Time after time, privileges were taken away, or he was sent to solitary confinement. I tried to imagine the abuse that he (and others in similar situations) had to endure for such a petty crime. Granted, his time in prison was extended when he was involved in an incident in which a prison guard was murdered (Jackson was charged with the murder, but was killed three days before the trial was due to commence), but as has become clearer and clearer to me each day that I have lived, our penal system is designed to abuse criminals, not reform them. Prison personnel have been given great freedoms to punish prisoners at every turn.
Late in the book is a collection of letters to his attorney, Fay Stender. These tend to be rather long, so considering that his letters were supposed to be no longer than the front and back of a standard letter-sized piece of paper, I suspect that these were handed to her during face-to-face conferences. No matter... they're quite dense with Jackson's view of the world, particularly how black people in this country have been kept down (while at the same time being expected to conform to and become one with white European constructs) which I found to be compelling and spot-on.
In some of Jackson's letters to Stender, he also makes it a point to mention his affection for her. How deeply this ran, of course, I have no clue, but I decided to do a web search to find out more... to see if there was a client-attorney relationship gone too far, to see what became of her, and to see if she was still practicing law in the Bay Area. I was disturbed to find that a member of Jackson's Black Guerrilla Family went to her home in 1979 while on parole and shot her several times in front of her children and a friend, leaving her paralyzed from the waist down. About a year later, after testifying against her attacker, she killed herself. That this happened eight years after Jackson's death was a little surprising. Considering that she was told to say that she had betrayed Jackson before being shot, I wondered if the attack might have been done at Jackson's behest; did he suggest it before he died? Or was the assailant such a rabid follower that he and other Family members took it upon themselves to punish her for not helping to acquire weapons for Jackson?
Following the letters to Stender are a collection of letters to Joan (I can't recall now if her full name was mentioned), with whom he appears to have had a quasi-romantic relationship, as well as some written to the activist Angela Davis. The letters to Davis are also peppered with words suggesting he was enamoured with her for more than just her politics, but that's conjecture. Sweetness oozed when writing to Joan, but Jackson was more philisophical with Davis, albeit with sweet sign-offs.
I found myself alternately liking Jackson and not. Mostly, I guess, I disliked his misogynistic attitude, in general, toward women, something that he disn't really show with Stender, Joan, or Davis. I wish I would have made note of his specific wording, but he clearly considered women a peg or two below men... or at least himself.
I've given this a five-start rating because I believe that it should be read by anyone wanting to understand some of the dynamics of this country's problems related to skin colour. The real substance of Jackson's militarism springs from a well-thought out view of the treatment of black people since they were first brought here as slaves.
December 22, 2022
Both an inspiring and heartbreaking book. Through his letters, I've only better understood how imprisonment breaks a person, and how lonely and alienating it is. It reminds me to work towards a world without prisons. Despite being incarcerated for 10 years, George never gave up, and never lost his spirit. He continued to fight, train, learn, to educate.
George was incredibly eloquent and articulate, he was so clearly intelligent. He touches on internationalism, rejects chauvinism, and constantly encourages his family to unlearn capitalism and bigotry. I also see his growth through the years, where he leaves his chauvinism towards women, and acknowledges their crucial role in the revolutionary struggle. I will definitely need to come back and revisit this book.
George was incredibly eloquent and articulate, he was so clearly intelligent. He touches on internationalism, rejects chauvinism, and constantly encourages his family to unlearn capitalism and bigotry. I also see his growth through the years, where he leaves his chauvinism towards women, and acknowledges their crucial role in the revolutionary struggle. I will definitely need to come back and revisit this book.
July 24, 2020
Settle your quarrels, come together, understand the reality of our situation, understand that fascism is already here, that people are already dying who could be saved, that generations more will live poor butchered half-lives if you fail to act. Do what must be done, discover your humanity and your love in revolution. Pass on the torch. Join us, give up your life for the people. - George Jackson
A great insight into the mind of a great revolutionary. Thank you George Jackson.
A great insight into the mind of a great revolutionary. Thank you George Jackson.
October 11, 2022
Jackson’s letters paint a portrait of a soulful, heartfelt revolutionary, of someone who recognizes the system that has entrapped him for exactly what it is, and who has dedicated his life to destroying it. These letters should still be read and appreciated decades later.
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July 24, 2020I read this book at the recommendation of Rob Barton, a D.C. guy incarcerated at the age of 16 for 30 years to life. He grew up poor and black in the "bad" part of D.C. and he said I should read this book to understand his childhood/culture and, in part, why he thinks the way he does. (Rob is like George in that he is charismatic and against the "system." People naturally follow him. But he is unlike George in that he is playing within the rules to get to a larger goal.)
I found the letters to be repetitive at times, but more importantly, I would have added in more background and context. I finally started doing my own research and found a wealth of information that put what I was reading into a different perspective. Other mysteries were never answered -- like who Z. was and why George suddenly stopped writing to her. That said, this book indeed did what Rob told me it would: opened my eyes to a world and life experience and outlook on the world we all need to understand. AND...the world needs more rebels willing to take big risks to speak truth to power!
I found the letters to be repetitive at times, but more importantly, I would have added in more background and context. I finally started doing my own research and found a wealth of information that put what I was reading into a different perspective. Other mysteries were never answered -- like who Z. was and why George suddenly stopped writing to her. That said, this book indeed did what Rob told me it would: opened my eyes to a world and life experience and outlook on the world we all need to understand. AND...the world needs more rebels willing to take big risks to speak truth to power!
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