Zinnformation pulls no punches

I'm a big admirer of Howard Zinn, though he's always been hard to recommend. His stuff is typically quite dense and not casually approachable - thick volumes on rather depressing subject matter. A People's History of the United States is a great book, but most folks wouldn't be able to get through it.

And so I was thrilled to find A Peoples History of American Empire at the comic shop down under the market (Golden Age Collectibles). It's a graphic novel adaptation of the People's History of the United States, plus parts of You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train. It gets you the core of Zinn's work, in a very digestable 263 pages of graphic novel format.

For those unfamiliar with Howard Zinn, he's a historian who focuses on telling the real struggles that most other historians tend to gloss over nostalgically. This particular book focuses on atrocities committed by the US Army, past Presidents, and major corporations. Without once ever dipping in to conspiracy theory (everything mentioned is factual, proven, and part of the oh-so-rarely-referenced public record) he makes the case that our government and corporations betray (and even murder) us for profit regularly and that our teachers and media lie to us to make the bloody past look like the good ol' days. Such has been going on for generations.

A wealth of first-hand sources (actual letters, diaries, and press clippings from the eras being studied) are referenced and excerpted in the People's History of the United States, so you're not just taking his word for it, you're actually reading what folks who went through it said at the time. People's History of the American Empire does much the same, using the people whose diaries were quoted in the original as characters telling their own story.

I can't recommend this book enough - it's relevant, revelatory, and revolutionary. It pulls no punches, yet is brief enough to get through it without depression setting in - despite being such a heavy subject, it's actually kinda morbidly fun to read. A damn good book, one that will open your eyes.

Here's a taste...

(Note that Viggo Mortensen's read of the text is somewhat lifeless and flat, the book itself is spunkier than the above would lead you to believe.)