Michael Gold

Gold, Michael 

(pseudonym of Irving Granich). Born Apr. 12. 1894. on the East Side in New York City, died May 15. 1967. in San Francisco. American writer, publicist, and critic. Born into an immigrant Jewish family.

Gold participated in the socialist movement beginning in 1914 and in the communist movement in the USA beginning in 1919. He was a contributor and then editor of the magazine New Masses. In 1921 he formulated the tasks of new revolutionary art in the programmatic article “Towards Proletarian Literature.” The theme of the collection of stories and poems 1 20 Million (1929; Russian translation, 1930) was the awakening of class consciousness among working people. The autobiographical novel Jews Without Money (1930; Russian translation, The Jewish Poor. 1931) portrays the life of the poor on the East Side. Gold was the author of the collection of articles Change the World! (1936). Together with M. Blankfort, he also wrote the historical drama Battle Hymn (1936; Russian translation, John Brown, 1937), glorifying the fighter for the emancipation of the Negroes. In the collection of articles Hollow Men (1941) Gold condemned decadents and renegades of the progressive movement. In 1952 he published a cycle of poems entitled Spring in the Bronx.

WORKS

The Mike Gold Reader. New York, 1954.
In Russian translation:
Prokliatyi agitator. Moscow, 1925.

REFERENCES

Carmon, W. “Maikl Gold i -N’iu = Messes.’ 1911–1916–1941.” Internatsionainaia literatura. 1941, no. 5.
Lawson, J. H. “The Stature of Michael Gold.” Political Affairs. June 1967. no. 6, pp. 10–14.

B. A. GIILENSON