Zayd Ayers Dohrn DANGEROUS, DIRTY, VIOLENT, AND YOUNG

May 26 | In-Store | 6:00 PM

Zayd Ayers Dohrn | Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young

was born underground, as he documented in his acclaimed podcast, . His parents were fugitives; his mother was on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list. Throughout his childhood, Dohrn’s parents said his birth marked a clean break with violent revolutionary struggle, but in (W. W. Norton & Company) he discovers that story wasn’t entirely true. Zayd–and his story–has deep Chicagoland roots, and we are proud to host him for this event and author-signing. Zayd will be in conversation with Chicago's own .

Doors and minibar open at 5:30PM

Getting here: We are located at 1620 Orrington Avenue, in downtown Evanston, just one block east of the Davis Street Metra and CTA public transit stops. There is metered street parking as well as numerous parking garages nearby.

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About Zayd: An acclaimed playwright and screenwriter, Zayd Ayers Dohrn is a professor and director of the MFA in Writing for Screen and Stage at Northwestern University. He is creator of the hit narrative podcast Mother Country Radicals and the rock protest musical Revolution(s).

About Alex: Alex Kotlowitz is the author of four books, including his most recent, An American Summer which was awarded the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize. His first book, the national bestseller There Are No Children Here, was selected by the New York Public Library as one of the 150 most important books of the twentieth century. His work has regularly appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine and on This American Life. His honors include an Emmy, two Peabodys, a George Polk Award and the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. The American Academy of Arts and Letters honored him for his books and journalism which “illuminate astonishing national inequities through the lens of individual experience. Alex is a professor at Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism.

About the book: Paul Thomas Anderson’s Academy Award-nominated One Battle After Another tells the fictional story of the revolutionary group The French 75. But the film, and the novel on which it’s based, both draw from the incredible real-life story of the Weather Underground and the Black Liberation Army.

Zayd Ayers Dohrn was born underground, as he documented in his acclaimed podcast, Mother Country Radicals. His parents were fugitives; his mother was on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list. Throughout his childhood, Dohrn’s parents said his birth marked a clean break with violent revolutionary struggle, but in DANGEROUS, DIRTY, VIOLENT, AND YOUNG: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground [W. W. Norton & Company], he discovers that story wasn’t entirely true.

DANGEROUS, DIRTY, VIOLENT, AND YOUNG adds layers of new information to what Dohrn explored in Mother Country Radicals. After the podcast, strangers shared stories and sent letters and photographs, revealing a more intimate side of his family legacy. Drawing on these materials, as well as interviews, declassified FBI files, and long-hidden diaries, Dohrn tells a new story of radical resistance, including revelations about the Weathermen’s bombing campaign, their secret alliance with the Black Liberation Army, and the dramatic Pr*son break of Assata Shakur.

Reckoning with the emotional damage the Weathermen inflicted on their victims, their children, and themselves, DANGEROUS, DIRTY, VIOLENT, AND YOUNG is an unflinching memoir that explores the roots of radicalism and asks how children survive when the place they feel safest—with their family—also puts them in danger.

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