Life and work of the writer and Lincoln’s brigade member Alvah Bessie

Abstract

This biographical article discusses Alvah Cecil Bessie’s journey from a struggling but gifted writer during the great depression in the United States, to an outcast of popular culture. Bessie’s political tendency towards social justice and was invigorated by his experience in the Spanish Civil War as a volunteer of the Abraham Lincoln Batallion, as was his obsession on the Spanish events of the twentieth century. What he saw in Spain enhanced his politics and converted them into his principal preoccupation. His strong opposition to fascism took him to Hollywood where he worked on propaganda films in support of the war effort in the 1940s. Although the film industry quickly discarded him, Bessie never relinquished his fight to free Spain from fascism and raise public awareness of corresponding forces of oppression in his own country.