Devin Thomas O'Shea - Veiled Prophet
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Devin Thomas O'Shea - The Veiled Prophet: Secret Societies, White Supremacy, and the Struggle for St. Louis
Presented by Left Bank Books & the Left Bank Books Foundation
We are honored to welcome Devin Thomas O'Shea to speak about his new highly anticipated book The Veiled Prophet. A provocative look at the secret society that has controlled St. Louis for over a century, revealing how shadowy elites organize themselves against working-class power. This book will be the talk of the town!
"The Veiled Prophet is a dark romp through the backrooms of American history. This thoroughly-researched true story reads like fiction: thrilling, colorful, and very, very funny." --Colette Shade, author of Y2K: How the 2000's Became Everything
"Devin Thomas O'Shea's The Veiled Prophet inducts readers into white supremacy's back room, revealing the pomp and circumstance of racism, the gaudy esoterica that is presumed to elevate brute domination into something sublime and mysterious. O'Shea tells the story of the racial phantasmagoria of Midwestern elites with great clarity and insight." --Greg Grandin, author of America, América: A New History of the New World
O'Shea will personalize and sign copies after the presentation! Personalized and signed copies will be available to be mailed anywhere in the country. For personalized copies, please order before noon on July 7th.
Join us at Left Bank Books
Please RSVP for this event
https://forms.gle/zmzkhiKd8NciRt1w9
Watch the livestream on Left Bank Books' YouTube Page
https://www.youtube.com/@LeftBankBooks/streams
This event is possible thanks to the support of individual donations to the Left Bank Books Foundation. Donate today!
https://lbbfound.org/
Your presence is a gift. When you attend our readings and purchase visiting authors' titles, you help us sustain our events calendar and continue to offer free literary programming to the community. Join us!
About the Speaker
Devin Thomas O'Shea is a writer whose work has appeared in The Nation, Slate, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Iowa Review, Jacobin, Boulevard, and elsewhere. He lives in St. Louis, Missouri.
About The Veiled Prophet: Secret Societies, White Supremacy, and the Struggle for St. Louis
A provocative look at the secret society that has controlled St. Louis for over a century, revealing how shadowy elites organize themselves against working-class power.
Every December in downtown St. Louis, the city's upper crust attend a garish costume party that doubles as a debutante's ball. The daughters of high society are paraded to the throne of a cloaked monarchical figure, and bow to the Veiled Prophet of Khorassan. At first glance, the event seems outdated and clownish, but in truth the Veiled Prophet Society has functioned as an exclusive club for the "city fathers," where solidarity is built between wealthy men who head major U.S. corporations, banks, and control whole industries. At the Veiled Prophet's Ball, these titans of capital come together to crown one of their daughters the Queen of Love and Beauty, and celebrate the breaking of strikes, the sabotage of protests, and the enforcement of racial hierarchies.
Devin Thomas O'Shea's The Veiled Prophet is the definitive history of the Veiled Prophet Society in all its violence and pageantry, offering a colorful alternate history of the United States through the lens of the Midwestern elite. O'Shea follows the Veiled Prophet Society from its origins in the wake of the 1877 general strike, through the 1904 World's Fair, to the height of the Prophet's--and St. Louis's--influence during the Cold War. The Veiled Prophet examines the unexpected ways this secret society has shaped the course of history, from the CIA to the Vietnam War to the assassination of Martin Luther King.
Yet the power wielded by the Veiled Prophet has not gone uncontested. Since the Gilded Age, the Prophet has faced resistance from orphans armed with pea-shooters, Communist Party organizers during the Depression, Civil Rights icons, and renegade debutantes. The Ferguson uprising of 2014 was only the most recent challenge to the Prophet's influence.
As the fight for the soul and streets of St. Louis intensifies, it's more critical than ever that we expose the sordid history of these powerful, masked figures and their control over our democracy.
Presented by Left Bank Books & the Left Bank Books Foundation
We are honored to welcome Devin Thomas O'Shea to speak about his new highly anticipated book The Veiled Prophet. A provocative look at the secret society that has controlled St. Louis for over a century, revealing how shadowy elites organize themselves against working-class power. This book will be the talk of the town!
"The Veiled Prophet is a dark romp through the backrooms of American history. This thoroughly-researched true story reads like fiction: thrilling, colorful, and very, very funny." --Colette Shade, author of Y2K: How the 2000's Became Everything
"Devin Thomas O'Shea's The Veiled Prophet inducts readers into white supremacy's back room, revealing the pomp and circumstance of racism, the gaudy esoterica that is presumed to elevate brute domination into something sublime and mysterious. O'Shea tells the story of the racial phantasmagoria of Midwestern elites with great clarity and insight." --Greg Grandin, author of America, América: A New History of the New World
O'Shea will personalize and sign copies after the presentation! Personalized and signed copies will be available to be mailed anywhere in the country. For personalized copies, please order before noon on July 7th.
Join us at Left Bank Books
Please RSVP for this event
https://forms.gle/zmzkhiKd8NciRt1w9
Watch the livestream on Left Bank Books' YouTube Page
https://www.youtube.com/@LeftBankBooks/streams
This event is possible thanks to the support of individual donations to the Left Bank Books Foundation. Donate today!
https://lbbfound.org/
Your presence is a gift. When you attend our readings and purchase visiting authors' titles, you help us sustain our events calendar and continue to offer free literary programming to the community. Join us!
About the Speaker
Devin Thomas O'Shea is a writer whose work has appeared in The Nation, Slate, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Iowa Review, Jacobin, Boulevard, and elsewhere. He lives in St. Louis, Missouri.
About The Veiled Prophet: Secret Societies, White Supremacy, and the Struggle for St. Louis
A provocative look at the secret society that has controlled St. Louis for over a century, revealing how shadowy elites organize themselves against working-class power.
Every December in downtown St. Louis, the city's upper crust attend a garish costume party that doubles as a debutante's ball. The daughters of high society are paraded to the throne of a cloaked monarchical figure, and bow to the Veiled Prophet of Khorassan. At first glance, the event seems outdated and clownish, but in truth the Veiled Prophet Society has functioned as an exclusive club for the "city fathers," where solidarity is built between wealthy men who head major U.S. corporations, banks, and control whole industries. At the Veiled Prophet's Ball, these titans of capital come together to crown one of their daughters the Queen of Love and Beauty, and celebrate the breaking of strikes, the sabotage of protests, and the enforcement of racial hierarchies.
Devin Thomas O'Shea's The Veiled Prophet is the definitive history of the Veiled Prophet Society in all its violence and pageantry, offering a colorful alternate history of the United States through the lens of the Midwestern elite. O'Shea follows the Veiled Prophet Society from its origins in the wake of the 1877 general strike, through the 1904 World's Fair, to the height of the Prophet's--and St. Louis's--influence during the Cold War. The Veiled Prophet examines the unexpected ways this secret society has shaped the course of history, from the CIA to the Vietnam War to the assassination of Martin Luther King.
Yet the power wielded by the Veiled Prophet has not gone uncontested. Since the Gilded Age, the Prophet has faced resistance from orphans armed with pea-shooters, Communist Party organizers during the Depression, Civil Rights icons, and renegade debutantes. The Ferguson uprising of 2014 was only the most recent challenge to the Prophet's influence.
As the fight for the soul and streets of St. Louis intensifies, it's more critical than ever that we expose the sordid history of these powerful, masked figures and their control over our democracy.
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Where is it happening?
399 N Euclid Ave, St. Louis, MO, United States, Missouri 63108, 391 N Euclid Ave, St Louis, MO 63108-1245, United States, Clayton
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Host or PublisherLeft Bank Books
