I am now reading and researching yet again, as I put together an article on George Orwell‘s encounters with the POUM in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War; it’s sort of a trial balloon for the thesis that I will be writing for the University of Victoria, in the far, far far future (2018). Even though the program won’t even begin until September of NEXT YEAR, I still need to get everything in order before formal application time – one of those things being a published article.
The thesis will deal with Totalitarianism via the Novel, an examination of fiction that dealt with the political extremities of the interwar years in Europe; specifically, I’ll be looking at that cauldron of ideologies, Spain during the Civil War, which every major player recognized as a linchpin for the decade to follow. Stalinism, anarchism, and fascism were all present, but I’d like to focus on the dissident Trotskyites that were actually indigenous to Spain, the POUM.
Both Hemingway and Orwell had encounters with the group (particularly the latter), but I think it is fascinating how understudied the POUM are, at least outside of deep Spanish academia and the annals of dissident leftists. Orwell and Trotsky himself had mixed feelings about the group, and it should make for interesting reading in unpleasant times, with genuine fascism on the rise and becoming ascendant. Yes, Mr Lewis, it can happen here. Fascism is not some sort of German disease – given the right circumstances, it can pop up anywhere. Including the last “superpower” (BTW, start learning Mandarin).
So here are some trenchant observations that I made whilst studying this bizarre stretch of history:
Fuck the 90s – Unless you like celebratory right wingers dancing on the “corpse” of communism. As if communism was limited to the Soviet Union only, and was somehow missing in the hearts and minds of millions of people in the so-called Third World. Regardless of that nagging detail, neo-liberals everywhere gave toasts to the “end of history“, and wrote reams of articles and books that reflect that rather hasty, inaccurate appraisal.
Just FYI: Karl Marx routinely tops the list of philosophers that are pulled from polls enacted by the those running dogs in the media. You know who doesn’t make the list, at all? Neo conservatives and Fukyshima. Eric Voeglin, Leo Strauss and hell, even Ayn Rand appear the very bottom, if at all. If nothing else, I don’t see any Third World regimes set up according to Rand’s rules, and George W Bush should give you a solid idea of Neo-conservatism in action. Thatcher tried the ol’ “There is no alternative. I am the state, and none shall stand in my way. Socialism is dead. And those mines have to go, along with the entire social safety net”. Then she was unceremoniously dumped by the rest of her party, who themselves were a little horrified.
Does that sound familiar? Party monster slain by his/her own party, as they themselves would like to win a re-election or two without getting spoiled like meat in the sun?
One other thing about the 90s: Don’t get me started on post-modernism, the question without an answer. That’s what passed for radical intercourse at higher educational levels during the 90s – post-everything, plus maybe some semiotics. Then Bush stole a fucking election and 9/11 happened, reminding us all that there is a real, concrete, dangerous world, and that people like Derrida and Foucault were intellectual frauds. Thankfully people in that real world I just mentioned haven’t paid attention to idiots like that for years, and now they’re laughing stocks even at the academy. It’s too bad we’re still stuck with Zizek – pumping volume after volume of incoherent nothingness for as long as Verso will pay him.
This is a better time to be a leftist academic, although I find it hilarious that every radical book that I read that preaches the greatest extremities, up to and including physical violence, will invariably denounce left-wing academics – even though every one of those writers are academics themselves. This is the reason why I love history and the study of history, as opposed to political “science”. Less pretension, less “predictive” capabilities, greater body of actual knowledge.
I’ll let whomever still follows this blog know when the article is finished and published.
better read than dead 