Left Book Club Anthology [Hardcover]

Paul Laity (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2001

The Left Book Club is something of a legend. Founded in 1936 to distribute cheap, radical books, it was a spectacular success, with nearly 60,000 members at its peak. Always controversial, its famous orange volumes told stories of life in Britain's industrial towns, rebellion in Hitler's Germany, and heroism in the Spanish Civil War. This anthology goes back to the monthly selections themselves and recaptures the fervor and idealism of the 1930s. It includes extracts from many of the Club's most popular books, including Orwell's The Road to Wigan Pier, Koestler's Spanish Testament, Edgar Snow's Red Star Over China, and Wilfred Macartney's Walls Have Mouths. Paul Laity introduces each extract and contributes an excellent general introduction explaining the political and cultural context of the Club.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

In 1936 British publisher Victor Gollancz founded the Left Book Club to promote socialism and to educate the masses on the growing threat of fascism. A senior editor at the London Review of Books, Laity presents excerpts from influential club selections, including George Orwell's The Road to Wigan Pier, Clifford Odets's Waiting for Lefty, and Edgar Snow's Red Star over China. He also provides brief introductions to these works, as well as a 22-page introduction outlining the club's history. At its height, the club boasted nearly 60,000 members. Despite its popularity, however, Gollancz was frequently criticized for his blind acceptance of the Communist Party line and his uncritical support of the Soviet Union. As a result of the party's opposition to British intervention in World War II, Gollancz, like Arthur Koestler and many other British intellectuals, abandoned communism. Their subsequent embrace of liberalism is generally credited with the rising fortunes of the Labour Party in 1945. Recommended for academic libraries, especially those with strong collections in the history of publishing. William Gargan, Brooklyn Coll. Lib., CUNY

Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Paul Laity is a senior editor at the London Review of Books.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Gollancz (July 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0575072210
• ISBN-13: 978-0575072213
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,352,979 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great introduction to the LBC, March 31, 2002

By 

Mr. Patrick A. Harrington "doublethink" (Edinburgh) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Left Book Club Anthology (Hardcover)

This book is a great introduction to the Left Book Club. Its introduction sets out how the Club worked: "members were committed to buying a designated title from his (Gollancz) list every month, for a minimum of six months. The books were often specialy commissioned for the LBC, but were sold to the general public at two or three times the club price of 2s 6d. They were distributed via bookshops and some newsagents. To encourage as many new readers as possible, the monthly choices were supposed to require 'not the slightest knowledge of politics, economics or history for perfect understanding.' Gollancz wanted to create an active political readership,an intellectual popular front."
He got the idea from the Book Society which operated a similar scheme as a conventional business.  (X)

The anthology ranges across political reportage, autobiography, plays, science (eugenics), history and fiction. Everyone will have their favourites. I particularly liked Spanish Testament by Koestler which tells of his imprisonment by Franco forces and Our Street by Jan Petersen which is "an account of left-wing resistance to Nazism in the Charlottenburg district of Berlin". I was also intrigued by extracts from the Left Song Book and would like to have seen more of their Five Famous Rounds with New Words. The extract from Prices Rise (sung to the tune of Three Blind Mice) certainly whetted my appetite :

Prices rise, prices rise
See how they mount,
see how they mount
They've raised the price of your daily bread
And given you cruisers and guns instead
For they know it won't trouble you when your dead
That prices rise  (p.174)

The LBC was a powerful political force; one which always had strong links with the Communist Party. Paul Laity doesn't shy away from this issue. He makes it clear that "One aspect of the selection process was never made explicit - the unwillingness on the part of Gollancz, Strachey and Laski to criticise the Soviet Union and its leadership, or to publish anything which would seriously annoy the Communist Party." (XV) Strachey in particular was keen on Stalin, commenting on the show trials he said there was "no conceivable alternative after the accused had told their stories but to shoot them". (XVII)
Laity concludes that "It's pretty clear now that it came close to being a 'front' organisation."  (XV)

Perhaps it was inevitable that the enthusiasm and idealism of the LBC were accompanied by naivety. With the rise of Fascism in Europe young people had a clear enemy, and looked to Communism as a counter ideology and power. Orwell and other writers, however, were not comfortable with what came to be known as Stalinism.
Paul Laity has done an excellent job of putting the debates and works in a political and historical context.

Members of the LBC believed they could change the world... I hope that people read it now and take some of that with them.