Stuart Christie, Granny Made Me an Anarchist: General Franco, the Angry Brigade and Me (Scribner, 2004)
Written By: Liz Willis
Date: September 2004
Date: September 2004
Published In LSHG Newsletter Issue 22: Autumn 2004
Stuart Christie's memoir spans the third quarter of the twentieth century, and the subtitle alludes to the two episodes when he became spectacularly embroiled with its history: in 1964 he was caught carrying explosives into Spain to facilitate General Franco's assassination, and then, after serving three years of a 20-year sentence and trying to pick up the threads of his life back in Britain, he turned up at the wrong house on the wrong day and was framed as a participant in the Angry Brigade bombing campaign of the early 1970s, only to be acquitted along with three of seven fellow-accused (the Stoke Newington 8).
His Granny comes into it as a strong influence on his childhood, along with other features of working-class life in the west of Scotland which combined to inculcate a social conscience, historical awareness, and a capacity for strict adherence to principles. Not perhaps qualities that are popularly associated with anarchism, but Christie argues his case for adopting that position intelligently, making connections and explaining his political trajectory via CND, anti-war activism, and Labour Party Young Socialists, with a passing attraction to IS (International Socialists) and a more lingering admiration for the Solidarity group. He writes entertainingly, with ever-present humour and a wealth of keenly observed detail that conveys the spirit of the times, places and people, even managing to enliven the grim experiences of prison life, and emphasising throughout the values of comradeship and the will to resist. In a passage worthy of inclusion in "Porridge", he recounts his narrow escape, due to a liking for "The Navy Lark" on the radio, from being scooped up in a botched break-out. He gets the last word on Franco, describing his lingering demise in the last chapter - "Jesus clearly didn't want him as a sunbeam" (p. 422) - but concludes that it was just as well not to have been responsible for his death.
The wilfully anarchically-typed blurb nevertheless states that Christie "still believes in anarchist princles [sic]" and he maintains a kind of defence of political violence as perpetrated historically by anarchists, contrasting their careful selection of individual targets with the mass indiscriminate violence of the state, and by implication differentiating them from the terrorist stereotype of today. At the same time he is ready to criticise the more lunatic manifestations of the libertarian left, as in a certain "mad-house" commune of early-1970s London, and points out the self-defeating impossibility of trying to impose anarchist principles by authoritarian means.
For those who wish to find out more about the background, whether political or cultural, there are numerous inserts in the text, variously supplying historical and biographical detail, theoretical references and extracts, photographs, and the words of protest songs. These stand instead of appendices and footnotes, and the appearance of a non-academic reader-friendly volume is likewise reinforced by the lack of an index or bibliography; while the trimmings may be missed by trained historians, there are chapter headings and marginal subtitles (in small print, like old-fashioned history textbooks) to highlight topics as they come up and guide the eye. All in all it comes over as being accessible without any dumbing down of style or compromise of intellectual content (and very few misprints or errors, in spite of the back cover), an achievement which many other historians might envy.
It is not necessary to share all of Christie's views to find this an enjoyable read, to be glad the author survived everything two states tried to throw at him, and to wish it the success it deserves in exposing the machinations of those in power and expounding a radical alternative vision to a wider audience.
His Granny comes into it as a strong influence on his childhood, along with other features of working-class life in the west of Scotland which combined to inculcate a social conscience, historical awareness, and a capacity for strict adherence to principles. Not perhaps qualities that are popularly associated with anarchism, but Christie argues his case for adopting that position intelligently, making connections and explaining his political trajectory via CND, anti-war activism, and Labour Party Young Socialists, with a passing attraction to IS (International Socialists) and a more lingering admiration for the Solidarity group. He writes entertainingly, with ever-present humour and a wealth of keenly observed detail that conveys the spirit of the times, places and people, even managing to enliven the grim experiences of prison life, and emphasising throughout the values of comradeship and the will to resist. In a passage worthy of inclusion in "Porridge", he recounts his narrow escape, due to a liking for "The Navy Lark" on the radio, from being scooped up in a botched break-out. He gets the last word on Franco, describing his lingering demise in the last chapter - "Jesus clearly didn't want him as a sunbeam" (p. 422) - but concludes that it was just as well not to have been responsible for his death.
The wilfully anarchically-typed blurb nevertheless states that Christie "still believes in anarchist princles [sic]" and he maintains a kind of defence of political violence as perpetrated historically by anarchists, contrasting their careful selection of individual targets with the mass indiscriminate violence of the state, and by implication differentiating them from the terrorist stereotype of today. At the same time he is ready to criticise the more lunatic manifestations of the libertarian left, as in a certain "mad-house" commune of early-1970s London, and points out the self-defeating impossibility of trying to impose anarchist principles by authoritarian means.
For those who wish to find out more about the background, whether political or cultural, there are numerous inserts in the text, variously supplying historical and biographical detail, theoretical references and extracts, photographs, and the words of protest songs. These stand instead of appendices and footnotes, and the appearance of a non-academic reader-friendly volume is likewise reinforced by the lack of an index or bibliography; while the trimmings may be missed by trained historians, there are chapter headings and marginal subtitles (in small print, like old-fashioned history textbooks) to highlight topics as they come up and guide the eye. All in all it comes over as being accessible without any dumbing down of style or compromise of intellectual content (and very few misprints or errors, in spite of the back cover), an achievement which many other historians might envy.
It is not necessary to share all of Christie's views to find this an enjoyable read, to be glad the author survived everything two states tried to throw at him, and to wish it the success it deserves in exposing the machinations of those in power and expounding a radical alternative vision to a wider audience.
No comments:
Post a Comment