Speak Now Against the Day

“Make room on your library shelf . . . for John Egerton’s magnificent Speak Now Against the Day. His book is a stunning achievement: a sprawling, engrossing, deeply moving account of those Southerners, black and white, who raised their voices to challenge the South’s racial mores. . . . [This] is an eloquent and passionate book, and . . . one we cannot afford to forget.” — Charles B. Dew, New York Times Book Review

“[A] superb book, measured but eloquent.” — Dan T. Carter, Washington Post Book World

“Rich and compelling. . . . For anyone interested in the emergence of the civil rights movement or anyone who simply loves a well-written history, Speak Now Against the Day is a must read.” — Journal of Southwest Georgia History

“John Egerton has brilliantly uncovered the lost chapter of the civil rights movement. . . . Speak Now Against the Day will be the standard history of the early civil rights movement against which all others will be measured.” — Boston Globe

“A grand achievement.” — Raleigh News & Observer

“A gift to the nation [and a] . . . heartbreaking but heroic story.” — Louisville Courier-Journal

“No school, library or home is complete without a copy of this important, inspiring and highly readable narrative.” — Nashville Banner

“Superb. . . . [A] remarkable, monumental book.” — Cleveland Plain-Dealer

“Here at last is the story of the South”s visionaries, its prophets, its unsung heroes — the men and women, black and white, who tried to tell us, long before Brown vs. Board of Education, that segregation was a cancer on the American soul. . . . This is a book the South and the nation have been waiting for, have sorely needed, for the past half-century." — Vernon Jordan, former president of The Urban League

“A rich and inspiring story. . . . [Egerton] has uncovered a buried treasure.” — Studs Terkel