From the Ashes

Sarah Jaffe argues that ours is an age of widespread loss, yet one that leaves little room to acknowledge it. The losses range from the private grief of a single COVID death to the planetary damage of climate change. Hopes and expectations are unraveling, and dreams and aspirations are being cut short. Jaffe describes this as capitalism's death phase. Wealth for a few has come at an enormous cost to others. The marginalized and vulnerable have felt the crisis for a long time, but it is increasingly reaching everyone. Meanwhile, people are denied the chance to mourn the futures being taken from them, which is why she treats taking time to grieve as a radical act. The book combines in-depth reporting with memoir. Jaffe shows how public memorialization can be more than a refusal to forget, because it can become a way of imagining a better world. Her argument is that people who can mourn the lives, homes, and worlds they have lost are better prepared to fight for a transformed future.