Here Where We Live Is Our Country

A vivid, human and radical history of one of the most powerful revolutionary movements of the twentieth century - told through the lives and in the voices of countless forgotten men and women

‘A gripping, human story of love, idealism and betrayal - and an immense, rigorous contribution to the historical record. Reading it feels revolutionary’ Naomi Klein

Here Where Live Is Our Country is the story of a revolutionary movement – the Jewish Bund – which played a part in nearly every major conflict in Eastern Europe from 1900-1945, but still remains an almost unknown part of twentieth-century history.

The movement’s central philosophy of “herenes” – the belief that Jews had a right to freedom and dignity in the countries where they lived – led them to fight the Tsar, reject Zionism, resist the Nazis, and ultimately help lead the Warsaw ghetto revolt. It is also a philosophy that immediately resonates with the political situation all over the world today.

In this book, Molly Crabapple tells the story of the Bund through the lives of the bold and brilliant individuals who were pivotal to carrying out the doctrine, including her own great-grandfather, through whom she first discovered the movement.

Molly Crabapple is an artist and writer. She is the co-author of Brothers of the Gun, an illustrated collaboration with Syrian war journalist Marwan Hisham, which was a New York Times Notable Book and longlisted for the 2018 National Book Award. Her memoir, Drawing Blood, received global praise and attention. Her animated films have been nominated for five Emmys and won an Edward R. Murrow Award, and her live-illustrated journalism has included collaborations with Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, Jay Z, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and The ACLU. Crabapple’s reportage has been published in the New York Times, New York Review of Books, Paris Review, Vanity Fair, Guardian, New Yorker and Rolling Stone. She has been awarded multiple fellowships and won the Bernhardt Labor Journalism Award in 2022.
mollycrabapple.com