Voltairine de Cleyre

Biography

Voltairine de Cleyre (1866–1912) was an American anarchist writer, poet, and lecturer, considered one of the most eloquent and original voices in the anarchist tradition. Named after Voltaire by her freethinker father, she became radicalized after the Haymarket affair of 1886. De Cleyre advocated for “anarchism without adjectives,” refusing to align exclusively with any single anarchist school. Her essays, poems, and speeches addressed women’s liberation, education reform, labor rights, and the critique of state and church power. Emma Goldman called her “the most gifted and brilliant anarchist woman America ever produced.”