George L. Jackson

Published in 1972, “Blood In My Eye” is a collection of writings by George Jackson, a political prisoner and a Black freedom fighter. He finished the writings shortly before prison guards murdered him in August 1971. George had been convicted over a decade prior at age 18 — taking $70 from a gas station resulted in a conviction with an indeterminate sentence - one year to life. Blood in My Eye considers more broadly questions of armed struggle, communism, and Black revolutionary thought, or put simply, “it is a book about taking the revolution that George worked and died for inside prison out into society at large.”

From Library Journal Jackson gained notoriety shortly before his death in 1970 when his younger brother unsuccessfully tried to free him at gunpoint when Jackson and two others were on trial for killing a guard. Written between 1964 and 1970 while serving time in Soledad Prison for robbery, the letters reveal the brutality and racism faced by prisoners and call for unity among African Americans. This edition contains a new foreword by Jackson's nephew Jonathan. Soledad Brother remains "recommended for most libraries" and is a solid title for Black History Month in February. Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.