Clocking in at a mere seven hundred pages, give or take, The Communist Movement at a Crossroads: Plenums of the Communist International’s Executive Committee, 1922-1923, the eighth volume of John Riddell's awesome edition of documents from the Comintern in Lenin's time, will be out later this year. (As with everything in the Historical Materialism book series, it will then be issued in paperback … [Read more...]
Interview with Ceri Dingle, director of “Every Cook Can Govern: The Life, Impact and Works of C.L.R. James”
The word went around a few years ago that someone in England was working on a documentary about the West Indian historian, revolutionary political theorist and pan-African eminence C. L. R. James (1901-1989). Like the long-promised dramatic film based on The Black Jacobins, James's book on the Haitian revolution, this seemed to me an excellent idea -- and, like it, probably doomed. … [Read more...]
George Breitman, review of Richard Wright, “American Hunger”
The following review by George Breitman -- who among other things wrote and edited a number of books about Malcolm X -- appeared in August 1977 issue of the Socialist Workers Party journal International Socialist Review, which is now defunct. I post it here, under fair use, as a service to other scholars sharing my interest in Wright and the history of the American left. (The neglect of Breitman … [Read more...]
Selfie Abuse
One finding of a German study discussed in my column last week is that the subjects most involved in generating and posting selfies tended to want their social-media contacts to post something besides selfies. Not exactly counter-intuitive, of course, but interesting to have confirmed with all due statistical finesse. I thought about including a selfie with the piece (the best I've ever taken … [Read more...]
No longer/Not yet: Jameson on the need for “big ideas”
The LeftEast interview with the American Marxist cultural theorist Fredric Jameson appeared a few days before the election, and its title — “People are saying ‘this is a new fascism’ and my answer is – not yet!” — has a different resonance now. There’s no indication of when, where, or how the interview was conducted, although some problems with the text suggest it was transcribed from a recording. … [Read more...]
Reviewing as First Draft of History
Last week Michiko Kakutani reviewed the first of two volumes of the latest Hitler biography for the New York Times. I’ve got Ian Kershaw’s double-decker biography, which is huge and ought suffice, but I read the review anyway, just to see what the occasion for another biography would be, short of, say, the author locating the real Hitler diaries. He hasn’t, and I finished the review no wiser … [Read more...]
Beyond a Boundary: The Extraterritorial C.L.R. James
I once told my telegenic comrade Dave Zirin (America's leading, if not only left-wing sports commentator) that, in my case. it is a matter of political responsibility not to appear on screen. Nonetheless, I serve as a talking head in Every Cook Can Govern: The Life, Work, and Impact of C.L.R. James, which premiers in London at the end of the month, with the DVD scheduled to be available in April. … [Read more...]
Coming Soon: Red Wedge, Issue #2
The second print issue of Red Wedge -- the tangible, magazine-format component of a larger project dedicated to "rekindling the revolutionary imagination" which includes a website, conference presentations, and who knows what all else -- goes to the printer in a few weeks, so it's a good time to reserve a copy. Or, better yet, to subscribe. The theme is "Art Against Global Apartheid," as explained … [Read more...]
Ecolalia
Umberto Eco died yesterday (Friday) at the age of 84. I've written about his work on occasion over the years, including something on his analysis of the comic strip Peanuts, That's not online. (My piece, that is.) As for Eco's commentary on Charles Schultz's work, it was published in Italian in 1963, and now available on the New York Review of Books site. It's too good not to quote: … [Read more...]
Niche marketing, ne plus ultra…
Apropos of nothing in particular.... because if I don't give in to impulse more readily, this blog is never going to take off.... a selection of offerings from the surprisingly crowded market for cat Tarot: from Elizabeth Wilson, Cultural Passions: "I don’t believe it’s possible to tell the future [...] However when, in the 1980s and 1990s, I gave “readings” at fundraising … [Read more...]