The Bard stands with the Reformers of Peterloo, and their shared genius in teaching history with music and song
Correcting the record
HELEN MERCER applauds a book that restores the contribution of US communists to the Civil Rights movement
(L to R) Louise Thompson Patterson at the 7th Federal Congress of the Democratic Women's Federation of Germany in Berlin, November 1960; Esther Cooper Jackson addressing a rally in Great Barrington, Massachusetts in 1968; Eslanda Goode Robeson c1947
[(L to R) German Federal Archives/Public domain/Pic:digital.library.ucla.edu/Los Angeles Daily News/Public domain]
SUE TURNER is fascinated by a book that researches who the largely immigrant workforce were that built the Empire State
MARIA DUARTE and MALC McGOOKIN review Sirat, The Testament of Ann Lee, EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert, and All You Need Is Kill
STEVE ANDREW recommends a Marxist analysis of the long chains of production that global corporations exploit
MARY CONWAY relishes the period detail but misses the drama in this unsatisfactory dramatisation of the subjugated life of George Eliot
IAN SINCLAIR welcomes a mainstream scholar to the ranks of left-wing critique of US foreign policy
PETER MASON is disappointed that the eponymous Count fails to put in an appearance
Organize, Fight, Win – Black Communist Women’s Political Writing
Edited by Charisse Burden-Stelly and Jodi Dean
Verso, £19.99
CLAUDIA JONES is well known as the driving force behind the establishment of the Notting Hill Carnival. Morning Star readers will also be aware that she was an American communist, a member of the CPUSA, and deported to Britain in 1955 having been indicted under the Smith Act.
Indictments under this Act, together with the House Un-American Activities Committee, decimated the leadership of the CPUSA as well as ruining the lives of sympathisers.
Similar stories
On the 121st anniversary of communist Claudia Jones’s birth ROGER McKENZIE looks at political events that shaped her, and those she helped shape
DAVID HORSLEY reminds us of the roots and staying power of one of the most iconic festivals around
PAUL BUHLE agrees that a grassroots movements for change in needed in the US, independent of electoral politics
PAUL FOLEY welcomes a dramatic account of the men and women involved in the pivotal moment of the 5th Pan African Congress