Stride Toward Freedom

Q: Do I have to buy the ebook to participate in a book club?

No, you don’t have to buy the ebook to participate, but we do recommend it to get the most out of your club. There are several premium social reading features that are only available when you buy the ebook, like annotations, reactions, comment threads, resources, discussion prompts, and more, all embedded right in the text. It’s a unique and immersive way to read.

Q: Why can’t I buy the ebook on the app?

It’s annoying, we know. App store rules prevent us from selling directly in the app, so for now you can only purchase ebooks on our website. Don’t worry: when you purchase an ebook on the web, it’s automatically added to your bookshelf in the app.

Q: How is Fable’s reader different from Kindle?

Kindle is a straightforward e-reader; Fable is an interactive e-reader that includes social features inside the ebooks. When you read an ebook on Fable, you can see and react to the text with others in real time. Start a discussion, share highlights and quotes, add emoji reactions—all of it lives right inside the book. It’s hard to explain and easy to see, so we recommend reading the free sample in one of our most active clubs to get a feel for it.

Q: Do you sell physical books too?

We do not sell physical books at this time. Wish we did? Let us know why here!

Q: Are book clubs free to join on Fable?

Most of our clubs are completely free to join. The only exceptions are clubs marked as “Premium” or “Career Development,” which do require a fee. You can find out more on each club’s detail page.

Q: How do I start a book club with this book on Fable?

The first step is to download the Fable app. From there, you’ll be able to create your own private or public book club and invite others to read with you. Once your club is created, click on the plus sign under “Currently reading” and search for this book to add it to your club.

By Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. & Clayborne Carson

Publisher Description

MLK’s classic account of the first successful large-scale act of nonviolent resistance in America: the Montgomery bus boycott.

A young Dr. King wrote Stride Toward Freedom just 2 years after the successful completion of the boycott. In his memoir about the event, he tells the stories that informed his radical political thinking before, during, and after the boycott—from first witnessing economic injustice as a teenager and watching his parents experience discrimination to his decision to begin working with the NAACP. Throughout, he demonstrates how activism and leadership can come from any experience at any age.

Comprehensive and intimate, Stride Toward Freedom emphasizes the collective nature of the movement and includes King’s experiences learning from other activists working on the boycott, including Mrs. Rosa Parks and Claudette Colvin. It traces the phenomenal journey of a community and shows how the 28-year-old Dr. King, with his conviction for equality and nonviolence, helped transform the nation and the world.

Download the free Fable app

Stay organized

Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.

Build a better TBR

Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building tool

Rate and review

Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tags

Curate your feed

Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities

Stay organized

Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.

Build a better TBR

Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building tool

Rate and review

Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tags

Curate your feed

Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities

41 Reviews

4.0

Anton

Created about 1 month ago

“Honestly all his works are worth reading. This is his first book and it covers first hand his experience with the Montgomery Bus Boycott which really put him on a national stage. I really enjoyed how you get to see not just what he did but why he did it. He does an amazing job at showing the reader how he comes to his ideals and philosophies through not only biblical truths but his reading of philosophers. The chapter Pilgrimage to Nonviolence is really interesting. You get to see his commentary on the works of people like Gandhi, Niebuhr, Marx, Locke, Hobbes, Plato, Nietzche and how they have shaped his thinking. It is also really cool to see how consistent his ideals and philosophies remain from his earlier movements. Some really good quotes throughout. These were some of my favorites. "Men often hate each other because the fear each other; they fear each other because they do not know each other; they do not know each other because they cannot communicate; they cannot communicate because they are separated" "True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice" "Through education, we seek to change attitudes; through legislation and court orders, we seek to regulate behavior"”

DyMiMu

Created 2 months ago

“Martin Luther King Jr. was thirty years old when this book was released. It details the Montgomery Bus Protests of 1955 – when he was 27. As I read this, I imagined myself or my friends who are at that age now, organizing city-wide nonviolent resistance movements. It’s a phenomenal testament to the human spirit that people in their twenties held such strong foundations in peace, secure in their mutual respect despite the absurdly stubborn oppression. The segregationists of 1950’s Montgomery are echoed in certain camps today, albeit their modern counterparts are much older. The tactics in Stride Toward Freedom feel fool-proof before they encounter the internet and oligarchy. I’m not sure what a modern nonviolent movement would look like, although I’m certain that a considerable part of this mindset is the constant peace and calmness of spirit detailed throughout this book. I see a lot of people spitting and swearing at the soldiers of the oppressors around the world, and I understand it, but I see a stronger method presented here by King. The whole point of peaceful protest is to teeter the see-saw of lawful injustice, even only a little bit. On one side, violence and bigotry and racism and any other divisive tactics utilized by those in authority to control. On the other side, peace and consistent resistance to anything other than mutual love. When tear gas or brute force or the threat of dogs is used against protesters it sends a message: get in line or else. Often, protesters respond in shock, and in anger. They may feel a spiritual urge to protect their autonomy and fight back – physically or verbally. This is the cycle, which can be selectively broadcast by the oppressors to persuade the public that protesters are really a fringe minority, very dangerous, unpredictable outliers. Yet, the crucial takeaway to this book about the daily grind of a year-long bus boycott, to me, is this: When instead, as the billy clubs come down, the righteous advocate sits and smiles; when the dogs charge, the righteous advocate sings a song; when the police advance on hastily furnished warrants for fictitious charges, the righteous advocate stands their ground with no name calling or physical gestures; this can no longer be easy spun by the media to look like something that it is not. There are only so many ways to report “violence used against people who, day after day, are peaceful in their manner yet stern in their demands.” Especially in an era when primary sources exist in the form of phone videos, one can’t look away from the obvious imbalance between the American citizens exercising their Constitutional rights peacefully and the use of force from the state. When countless videos exist for innumerable events, the media can only try to spin the facts so far before the people at large stop buying into the propaganda. I think anybody focused on creating lasting change in the world should read this book. Confront our era’s bad actors with grace and patience, so they know: we the people of this planet love it and love each other, and we are not going anywhere until that love blankets every hating heart.”

House of Pages and Paints

Created 2 months ago

Jen Rooney

Created 7 months ago

OrmBog

Created 8 months ago

“Informative and inspirational insights in pivotal historical events and in the ideas that was the foundation MLK's part in the struggle for civil rights. The version of the book i read was a danish translation from 1964.”

About Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), Nobel Peace Prize laureate and architect of the nonviolent civil rights movement, was among the twentieth century's most influential figures. One of the greatest orators in U.S. history, King is the author of several books, including Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, The Trumpet of Conscience, Why We Can't Wait, and Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? His speeches, sermons, and writings are inspirational and timeless. King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968.

Clayborne Carson is professor of history at Stanford University, the founding director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute, and director of the King Papers Project. The author and editor of numerous books, he is general editorial advisor to The King Legacy and lives in Palo Alto, California.