Professor Martin Miller, Duke University editor of The Russian Revolution (2001) and P. A. Kropotkin. Selected Writings on Anarchism and Revolution (1970, 1976) , and author of Freud and the Bolsheviks: Psychoanalysis in Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union (1998), The Russian Revolutionary Emigres, 1830-1870 1986) and the definitive biography Kropotkin (1976), writes:
This extraordinary volume should be required reading for anyone interested in the relevance of political thought on all sides of the spectrum. It is the most comprehensive analysis of anarchist theory to date, covering the entire sweep of the 19th and 20th centuries. While making clear their own interpretive preferences for the transnational and syndicalist aspects of anarchism, the authors are judicious in their assessment of the entire movement’s wide range of thinkers from Bakunin to Bookchin. The scholarship is impressive and the book provides a wealth of references for further research. Black Flame not only succeeds in bringing anarchist ideas into vivid relief in their historical contexts, but also shows the increasing relevance of an anarchist critique for our own time.
