Run Run Run

The obsessive inner forces that drove Abbie Hoffman (1936-89), antiwar protester, media manipulator and grassroots organizer, are illuminated in this engaging biography by his younger brother. Jack Hoffman's intimate first-person narrative is coauthored with Simon, cofounder of Four Wall Eight Windows publishing. The book offers close views of Abbie's troubled relationship with his conservative father, his contentious first marriage and his role in the 1969 Chicago Conspiracy trial. Also revealed are his constant drug use, including his 1973 cocaine bust and his fugitive years with ex-model Johanna Lawrenson, during which, as ``Barry Freed,'' he organized an environmentalist campaign to save the St. Lawrence Seaway. We learn that Abbie took lithium for manic-depressive disorder; Jack Hoffman retracts his statement alleging foul play, made shortly after Abbie died of barbituate poisoning, and describes his brother's self-medicating at the time of his death. Photos. (Sept.)