Bernie for Burlington

Join Pioneer Works and the New York Review of Books for the official launch of Dan Chiasson’s Bernie for Burlington—an epic account of the early days and rise of the young Bernie Sanders, in a bygone time and place that find, in the New York City of 2026, their thrilling sequel.

In this symphonic work of social history, Dan Chiasson reconstructs the rise of an American icon from his Brooklyn boyhood to the old-fashioned Vermont city where Bernie came of age. With in-depth reporting and remarkable scenes from his own hometown, Chiasson tracks a faint political signal that traveled from communes, hardluck neighborhoods, traditional businesses, and county fairs to the town meetings and ballot boxes through which Sanders built his socialist platform and took on a backroom Democratic machine. By the shores of Lake Champlain, Bernie found his coalition among Burlington’s often feuding communities: the conservative French-Canadian Catholics whose grandparents had worked in the mills; the puppeteers, hippies, and NYC transplants who’d moved to Vermont to find land and authenticity; the anti-nukers, activist nuns, baseball fans, developers, cops, and small businessmen like a pair of ice cream makers named Ben and Jerry.

Bernie captivated them all, running on the slogan “Burlington Is Not for Sale” to become the modern era’s first socialist mayor. This people’s epic shows us an American city transformed, one diner coffee and one neighborhood door-knock at a time. It’s a mesmerizing portrait of a politician, a place, and a movement that would change America––and a role model for the mayor now poised to transform New York.

This special launch event, co-presented by Pioneer Works and the New York Review of Books, will feature a conversation with Dan Chiasson and Jamaica Kincaid moderated by Joshua Jelly-Schapiro, with music and special performances from members of the Bread & Puppet Theater. Books will be for sale with ticketing and at the event, which will feature a book signing with Dan Chiasson.

About the speakers

Dan Chiasson is the author of five books of poetry, including Bicentennial (2014) and The Math Campers (2020), and a book of literary criticism. A longtime contributor to The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books, Chiasson is the Lorraine Chao Wang Professor of English and Chair of the English Department at Wellesley College. He was born and grew up in the People’s Republic of Burlington, Vermont.

Jamaica Kincaid was born in St. John’s, Antigua. Her celebrated books include At the Bottom of the River, Annie John, Lucy, The Autobiography of My Mother, My Brother, Mr. Potter, and See Now Then. She is Professor Emeritus at Harvard University and lives in North Bennington, Vermont, where, according to her friend Dan Chiasson, “her garden is the most beautiful place in the state.”

Bread & Puppet Theater was founded in 1963 by Peter and Elke Schumman on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Since 1974, Bread & Puppet has been based on a farm in Glover, Vermont, which was for many years the setting for the company’s annual Domestic Resurrection Circus, and is now also home to the Bread & Puppet Museum. Bread & Puppet is one of the oldest nonprofit political theatre companies in the country and tours widely, presenting radical and participatory puppet shows on the American continent and abroad.

Joshua Jelly-Schapiro is Director of Publishing at Pioneer Works and the co-editor-in-chief of Pioneer Works Broadcast. A geographer and writer, he teaches at NYU and writes for The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, and The New York Times, among many other publications. His books include Island People, Names of New York, and, with Rebecca Solnit, Nonstop Metropolis: A New York City Atlas.

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