In the course of his flamboyant career as an all-purpose activist, Saul Alinsky went from organizing working-class ethnics in one of Chicago`s most blighted neighborhoods to mapping out strategies for the civil rights and antiwar movements of the 1960s. He enlisted allies-from Catholic clergymen to labor unionists and black activists-in battles waged against opponents from slumlords to the Eastman Kodak corporation. The range of Alinsky`s activities, the intensity of his beliefs, and his exhilarating mixture of crudeness and calculation almost vibrate off the pages of this passionate and inspiring biography.