An American in the Making, the Life Story of an Immigrant


Read by Sue Anderson

(4.4 stars; 7 reviews)

“The sweat-shop was for me the cradle of liberty. . . It was my first university.” Attending lectures and the New York theatre at night; by day sewing sleeves into shirts in a ghetto shop, Marcus Eli Ravage (1884-1965) began his transformation from “alien” to American. His 1917 autobiography is a paean to the transformative power of education. Ravage emigrated from Rumania in 1900, at the age of 16. After working for several years as a “sleever” to save money, he enrolls in the University of Missouri (the least expensive school he can find), where culture shock overwhelms him at first. “I was not sure whether it was a pig or a sheep that bleated, whether clover was a plant and plover a bird, or the other way around.” But he adapts, and eventually embraces “the bigger and freer world” outside the immigrant ghetto. He writes that, because of his university experience, he was no longer “a man without a country.” He had become an American. - Summary by Sue Anderson (8 hr 41 min)

Chapters

Introduction 8:41 Read by Sue Anderson
The Prophet from America 24:49 Read by Sue Anderson
The Gospel of New York 24:33 Read by Sue Anderson
The Exodus 13:43 Read by Sue Anderson
To America on Foot 22:49 Read by Sue Anderson
Farewell Forever 20:32 Read by Sue Anderson
First Impressions 20:12 Read by Sue Anderson
The Immigrant's America 17:30 Read by Sue Anderson
"How do you like America?" 26:59 Read by Sue Anderson
Ventures and Adventures 39:45 Read by Sue Anderson
Purifications 26:03 Read by Sue Anderson
The Ethics of the Bar 22:33 Read by Sue Anderson
Shirts and Philosophy 28:32 Read by Sue Anderson
The Soul of the Ghetto 18:06 Read by Sue Anderson
The Tragedy of Readjustment 25:13 Read by Sue Anderson
The Trials of Scholarship 27:36 Read by Sue Anderson
Off to College 19:33 Read by Sue Anderson
In the Mold 27:16 Read by Sue Anderson
The American as He Is 28:02 Read by Sue Anderson
The Fruits of Solitude 27:48 Read by Sue Anderson
Harvey 29:40 Read by Sue Anderson
The Romance of Readjustment 21:18 Read by Sue Anderson

Reviews


(5 stars)

It is very well written and an eye opener to how emigrants felt back then and also today. Well worth the read.


(5 stars)

It ended rather abruptly but I enjoyed it very much.