Nat Hentoff

In his memoir, this iconoclastic writer on civil liberties, politics, and jazz, recalls what it was like growing up Jewish in Boston in the 1930s and 40s, shaped both by the ghetto and his indomitable desire for more. The reader follows him through his Roxbury neighborhood, witnessing as he organizes a successful strike at Sunday's Candies (the most coveted place of employment for Roxbury boys), gets booted out of Hebrew school (but bar mitzvahs nonetheless),...

"Boston Boy is Nat Hentoff's memoir of growing up in the Roxbury section of Boston in the 1930s and 40s. As he grapples with anti-Semitism, he develops a passion for outspoken journalism and First Amendment freedom of speech. He discovers his love of jazz and gets to know the great jazz artists of the day, Duke Ellington and Lester Young among others."--Jacket

A history of free speech in our country from earliest times to some of the controversial court cases of today involving school demonstrations and the right of Nazis to march.

"There are no dirty words, only dirty minds." - Lenny Bruce. The outrageous, groundbreaking comic whose iconoclastic material in a conservative era got him into tragic trouble is here profiled by a close friend who prefers to remember the laughs Lenny Bruce's memory evokes instead of the tears. With Lenny Bruce, Steve Allen, Paul Krassner, Mort Sahl, Kenneth Tynan, Nat Hentoff & Malcom Muggeridge.