It is easy to conflate communism with the evils of Soviet Russia. Edmund Wilson in his epic history of the left, reminds us that its origins sprung from the friendship between a middle-class son of Trier (where today his image adorns traffic lights!) and the scion of a Manchester-based cotton family. Marx and Engels alongside Babeuf and Saint-Simon and the US Owenite social optimists are explored in this brilliant, comprehensive and above all readable synthesis.
(Jeremy Miller - bwl 104 Spring 2022 ) |
