Description
Book SynopsisThe People's Joan of Arc': Mary Elizabeth Lease, Gendered Politics and Populist Party Politics in Gilded-Age America is the first comprehensive biography tracing the captivating life of renowned activist Mary Elizabeth Lease. While Lease is most remembered in American history textbooks as the radical leader of the Populist Party who directed desperate farmers to raise less corn and more hell, her influence and involvement in the late-nineteenth-century women's suffrage movement and early-twentieth-century feminist movement place her on par with luminaries such as Susan B. Anthony. Lease's story stretches from the American Civil War to the Great Depression and particularly illustrates how gender conventions and the related complexities of class and ethnic identity have historically shaped American politics. The diverse suits Lease wore, including housewife, teacher, lawyer, women's rights activist, temperance advocate, Populist Party orator, Knights of Labor activist, Irish Natio
Trade Review«Given the rise of third party politics in the US today as well as resurgence of immigration and bank regulation as political issues, Orr’s biography has relevance beyond the bounds of Mary Lease’s life. Orr’s portrait of Lease provides an insightful analysis of a woman deeply engaged with a wide array of political issues, yet profoundly skeptical of the efficacy of the socalled ‘‘political establishment.’’»
(Laura L. Lovett, Canadian Journal of History 52.1/2017)
