ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
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Empire is without virtue
RON JACOBS recommends an exhaustive demonstration that colonialism is insidious, pervasive, positive and negative
British Royal Marine poses with two severed heads during the Malayan Emergency. This photograph was first published on May 10 1952, by the Daily Worker (Morning Star) in a frontpage article titled "This Horror Must End".
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
MICK McSHANE rubs shoulders with Mod legend Steve Craddock and joins in with the joyous Glasgow choir
DENNIS BROE sifts out the ideological bias of the newest TV series offerings, and picks out what to see, and what to avoid
Empireworld
Sathnam Sanghera, Penguin, £10.99
POET and anti-war priest Daniel Berrigan wrote in his book The Nightmare of God: “We would like to think that the empire is virtuous. Or that it can be made so, converted, so to speak, by a large dose of civic virtue.” He concludes that it is not virtuous nor can it be made so.
I agree with Daniel Berrigan — empire is intrinsically without virtue.
In his newest book titled Empireworld: How British Imperialism Has Shaped the Globe, Sathnam Sanghera considers it at best a mixed bag, with the negatives outweighing the positives.
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