Despite acing an AP US History course, taught by a *very* liberal teacher in the heart of Massachusetts (in a former factory town!), I‘m just now learning about the suffragette slogan “Bread for all, & Roses too!”, which is inextricably linked to the Lowell Textile Mill Strike.
My soul is consumed; I need the words framed immediately.
Poem first, then context in the comments below:
https://www.zinnedproject.org/materials/bread-and-roses-song/
monalyisha It meant “that women were fighting for not just physical needs but also music, education, nature, art, leisure, and books…for pleasures as well as necessities, and the time to pursue them, the time to have an inner life and freedom to roam the outer world.” 11h
monalyisha In a 2022 interview with The Nation about her tagged book (referenced in my current read), Solnit said, “We all know what ‘bread‘ is: food, clothing, shelter; the bodily necessities, which can be more or less homogenized and administered from above. But ‘roses‘ was this radical cry, in a way, for individualism, for private life, for freedom of choice — because my roses and your roses won‘t be the same roses, you know?”![[tagged book]](https://image.librarything.com/pics/litsy_webpics/icon_taggedBook@3x.png)
Orwell's Roses 11h
Orwell's Rosesmonalyisha “Bread for All, and Roses too!” recognizes that “people are subtle, complex, subjective creatures who need culture, need nature, need beauty, need leisure.” 11h
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