The Virtual Stoa

Franz Mehring, biographer of Karl Marx and Spartacist, born in Schlawe, 27 February 1846, died in Berlin, 29 January 1919.

Ruth Cavendish-Bentinck, suffragist and socialist of illegitimate aristocratic origins;  she moved in Fabian circles; opposed vaccination; and became active in the Women’s Social and Political Union; she later established the Cavendish-Bentinck library for sufragists (now a part of the Women’s Library); and in later years became keen on Stalin’s Soviet Union. Born in Tangier, 21 October 1867, she died in London, 28 January 1953.

Ben Tillett, trade unionist and one of the leaders of the 1889 dockworkers’ strike; born in Bristol, 11 September 1860, died in London, 27 January 1943.

Raymond Williams, theorist and historian of culture, born 31 August 1921, died 26 January 1988.

Rutland Boughton, socialist composer, born in Aylesbury, 23 January 1878, died in Barnes, 25 January 1960. Achieved success with Midnight, a choral setting of words by Edward Carpenter in 1909; founder of the Glastonbury music festival, which ran from 1914 to 1926; and composer of music-dramas, often inspired by Arthurian mythology and Wagnerian example: The Immortal Hour, Bethlehem, The Round Table, The Birth of Arthur, Alkestis and The Queen of Cornwall. He joined the Communist Party for the first time in 1926, and left for the last time thirty years later. Hyperion occasionally releases recordings of his work, though I haven’t heard any of them.

Splendid news, over here.

In other rhino-related non-news, if you consult leading Anglo-dictionaries about the plural of the word “rhinoceros”, you will be able to take your pick from “rhinocoeros”, “rhinoceroses”, “rhinocerotes”, “rhinoceroes”, “rhinocero’s”, “rhinoceri”, “rhinocerons” or “rhinocerontes”. I think this is very fine.

UPDATE [29.1.2007]: See the baby rhino (58kg) walking around over at the BBC.

There’s already an internet petition, over here.

Quite a good piece in the English Spiegel magazine.

John Burns, socialist politician and Liberal MP. Apparently converted to the cause of socialism by reading Mill’s Principles of Political Economy, Burns was a member of the Social Democratic Federation, and one who pursued parliamentary strategies after that organisation split. Briefly jailed in 1887 after fighting with police in Trafalgar Square and elected to London County Council in 1889 for Battersea, Burns became famous for his oratory during the Dockers’ Strike, and in 1892 was elected MP for Battersea. Sticking with the Liberals, rather than join Keir Hardie’s ILP or the Labour Representation Committee, Burns entered the Cabinet in 1906 as President of the Local Government Board, though his six years there were undistinguished. Briefly President of the Board of Trade in 1914, he resigned from the Government on the outbreak of war, believing that Britain should stay out of European controversies. Born in Lambeth, 20 October 1858, died in Wandsworth, 24 January 1943.

Paul Robeson [also], American actor, singer, anti-racist and socialist; born in Princeton, NJ, 9 April 1898, died in Philadelphia, PA, 23 January 1976.

Paul Robeson sings the Hymn of the Soviet Union here.

We haven’t had a picture of Enkidu for a while. Here he is, in his favourite Place.

Elizabeth Andrews, suffragist and socialist; she organised the Co-operative Women’s Guild in the Rhondda, 1910-19, and was later Labour Party women’s organiser for Wales. Born in Penderyn, Glamorgan15 December 1882, died, also in Glamorgan, 22 January 1960.

My old friend Raj Patel, who used to blog at Class Worrier, is now running a new blog over at Stuffed and Starved, on the politics of the world food system, which is a sort of multimedia hyperspace experience thingy designed to supplement his book of the same name. Except the book hasn’t been published yet. He’s in Nairobi right now, at the World Social Forum, and it’s not a wholly happy place: see “Forum for Sale“.

Not so long ago I posted pictures of the river Thames just a few hundred yards from where I live, swollen by the rain and flooding Port Meadow. This afternoon it seems that some poor kid rode his bike into the river and may have drowned there.

(I can hear the helicopter overhead.)

I don’t really think of myself as someone who goes to many live performances of the so-called popular so-called music, but of the very few I’ve been to, it seems that one of them was almost one of the “twenty five best gigs ever“, according to the Observer (though there don’t seem to be 25 on the linked page; perhaps you’re supposed to buy the magazine or something to get them all. I don’t know.)

Anyway, there on the list: Mano Negra at the Town and Country Club, in 1989. I say “almost” as I don’t think I was there then; memory tells me I saw them there in 1990 or 1991, so maybe that’s because they were quite good in 1989, and got invited back or something. So perhaps it doesn’t count. Anyway: they were very good on that occasion, and great fun.

If I were to make a list of the 25 best concerts that I’ve been to, that one would certainly make the cut, though it would end up being quite a lot lower down than, say, Anne Evans singing Isolde at Covent Garden around 1993. That was really good. Splendid, even.

Eric Arthur Blair, better known to the world as George Orwell, critic of Soviet communism, born Motihari, India, 25 June 1903; died London, England, 21 January 1950.

(In his review of Nick Cohen’s new book, Christopher Hitchens mentions “pseudo-radicals who said there was nothing to choose between Nazi imperialism in Europe and British rule in India”. Is this a reference to Orwell’s ‘Not Counting Niggers?‘, or to something else?)