I Ain't Marchin' Anymore!

New York: David McKay Company, Inc, 1969. Presumed First Edition, First printing. Hardcover. Very good/Good. Tom Lesley (Author photograph). viii, [2], 180. [2] pages. DJ has wear and soiling, is price clipped and is in a plastic sleeve. Ink notation inside the front cover and comment and marks on pages vii and viii. Dotson Rader (born July 25, 1942, in Evanston, Illinois) is an American author and playwright who has published four novels and three works of non-fiction as well as the stage play God Looked Away about Tennessee Williams. Initially a student at Columbia University with a side gig as a male hustler, Rader made his way into the elite echelons of the New York City literary scene. During the 1970s, he became the live-in love of the actress Ruth Ford. He is the author of several books, including I Ain't Marchin Anymore, about the on-campus protests and upheaval during the 1960s, the title inspired by the earlier song by Phil Ochs of the same name, and Cry of the Heart, about his long friendship with the famed American playwright Tennessee Williams, which began in the 1950s. For many years Rader has penned features and conducted interviews for Parade magazine. Rader's first play, God Looked Away, about Tennessee Williams, had a six-week trial run at the Pasadena Playhouse in Pasadena, California, in 2018 with Al Pacino in the titular role and Judith Light and Garrett Clayton in other featured turns. A journalistic tour of the late sixties and their activism. Mr. Rader is a effective chronicler. I Ain't Marchin' Anymore! is an anti-war anthem. Phil Ochs is making the statement that after having killed so much, and after having lost so much in generations past, he, as a human, is done marching to war and hopes that others will join him. In this song, Ochs is singing from the voice of those who have fought wars throughout history. Starting with the Battle Of New Orleans from 1815, Ochs' soldier goes through Little Big Horn, the American Civil War, and two World Wars. Looking back, he wonders where it got him and why he's still fighting. When he released this song in 1965, the Vietnam War was escalating, but "I Ain't Marching Anymore" isn't specifically about that conflict. Ochs knew that topical protest songs had short shelf lives, and he wanted the song to last. He was happy with the results, citing it as one of his personal favorites. This song provided the title of the 1969 book I Ain't Marching Anymore by Dotson Rader, which deals with the Vietnam War protest movement. Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War (before) or Anti-Vietnam War Movement (present) began with demonstrations in 1964 against the escalating role of the United States in the Vietnam War and grew into a broad social movement over the ensuing several years. This movement informed and helped shape the vigorous and polarizing debate, primarily in the United States, during the second half of the 1960s and early 1970s on how to end the war. Many in the peace movement within the United States were children, mothers, or anti-establishment youth. Opposition grew with participation by the African-American civil rights, second-wave feminist movements, Chicano Movements, and sectors of organized labor. Additional involvement came from many other groups, including educators, clergy, academics, journalists, lawyers, physicians - such as Benjamin Spock - and military veterans. Their actions consisted mainly of peaceful, nonviolent events; few events were deliberately provocative and violent. In some cases, police used violent tactics against peaceful demonstrators. By 1967, according to Gallup polls, an increasing majority of Americans considered military involvement in Vietnam to be a mistake, echoed decades later by the then-head of American war planning, former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara.