The Spark

the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist

“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx

Culture Corner—The Rebel Girl & Flee

Mar 14, 2022

Book: The Rebel Girl: An Autobiography, My First Life (1906—1926) by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, new edition, 1973.

In honor of International Women’s History month, the book recommended is The Rebel Girl. It is about one of America’s powerful speakers and labor organizers, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn. More history than autobiography, Flynn chose to describe the events, battles, strikes and the people in them in which she was involved in fighting the crushing and violent power of the capitalist class. She makes history come alive in her descriptions of the Lawrence Textile Strike and the Paterson Silk Strike. She aptly shows the courage and determination of the participants.

Film: Flee, 2021

Flee, directed by Danish filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen, Oscar nominated, available for free on Hulu, and on Amazon Prime for a small fee.

In Flee, the Grand Jury Prize winner at this year’s Sundance Festival, the director tells the story of a child refugee, “Amin,” who flees Afghanistan in 1989 and then perestroika-era Russia in 1991 and his and his family’s life and death struggles to find safety and a home. The story is told brilliantly through the use of animation necessary to protect even today the identity of the adult “Amin” as he looks back over his life, his and his family’s numerous traumas, his search for love, his acceptance of his identity as a gay man, and his quest to meet his sense of responsibility. The elegant digital animation is interspersed with live-action TV footage, making the animation even more chilling and real.