Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Zinn, Howard - Margaret O'Brien (review date 5 February 1965)

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Margaret O'Brien (review date 5 February 1965)

SOURCE: O'Brien, Margaret. Review of SNCC: The New Abolitionists, by Howard Zinn. Commonweal 81, no. 19 (5 February 1965): 616-17.

[In the following review, O'Brien maintains that Zinn overestimates SNCC's potential to effect major changes in America unrelated to racial issues.]

From February 1, 1960 when the first sit-ins occurred in Greensboro, North Carolina, to Spring, 1964, young members of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee moved across the South, organizing sit-ins, freedom rides, and voter registration drives. Their efforts put them on intimate terms with cattle prods, jail cells, and a cast of law enforcement officials whose style of rule would warm the heart of—maybe Ivan the Terrible.

This book is built on the personal accounts of these young men and women. It is journalism; it is “human interest”; and it is valuable. We remember that behind...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. Ralph Ellison (review date 8 November 1964)
   2. Allan R. Brockway (review date 25 November 1964)
   3. Martin B. Duberman (review date winter 1965)
   4. Margaret O'Brien (review date 5 February 1965)
   5. David P. Gauthier (review date November 1967)
   6. Carl Cohen (review date 2 December 1968)
   7. Simon Lazarus (review date 7 December 1968)
   8. Saville R. Davis (review date 16 January 1969)
   9. Courtney R. Sheldon (review date 30 July 1970)
   10. Ralph Stone (review date September 1970)
   11. Philip Green (review date December 1970)
   12. William L. O'Neill (review date June 1973)
   13. Peter Michelson (review date 28 July 1973)
   14. James T. Patterson (review date September 1973)
   15. Michael Kammen (review date 23 March 1980)
   16. Bruce Kuklick (review date 24 May 1980)
   17. Oscar Handlin (review date autumn 1980)
   18. Charles Glass (review date 24 October 1980)
   19. Erwin Knoll (review date February 1991)
   20. George Scialabba (review date 13 May 1991)
   21. Howard Zinn and Jack McEnany (interview date summer 1991)
   22. Michael Kazin (review date December 1991)
   23. Mark A. Graber (review date spring 1992)
   24. Paul Buhle (review date 21 November 1994)
   25. Matthew Rothschild (review date January 1995)
   26. Maurice Isserman (review date September 1995)
   27. Howard Zinn and David Barsamian (interview date July 1997)
   28. Harvey Wasserman (review date March 1998)
   29. Mariel Garza (review date July 1999)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright