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The Voltairine de Cleyre Reader

Voltairine de Cleyre

Individualist / anarcha-feminism

It preserves a distinctive voice in American anarchist and anarcha-feminist thought, often overshadowed by her contemporaries.

Synopsis

A collection of essays, speeches, and poems by an anarchist who defended individual liberty, women's autonomy, and an anarchism beyond fixed labels.

Core passage idea

Paraphrase · Public domain

No system of authority, whether state, church, or convention, has the right to override the free judgment and self-ownership of the individual.

It fuses individualist anarchism with a fierce feminism, insisting liberty is meaningless if it stops at the threshold of women's lives.

To avoid a bubble

Pair with Emma Goldman, Anarchism and Other Essays.

Reading note

Read across the genres collected here; her arguments evolve, and she resisted being pinned to any single anarchist school.

Best paired with

Emma Goldman, Anarchism and Other Essays

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