Transcripts For CSPAN2 On 20240705

My is e tammy kim and im a writer at the new yorker and the cohost the podcast. Time to say goodbye. Today i have the luck of talking to china mieville, a writer of uncommon breadth integrity and precision work ive admired for a long time. Many of you know china as the author of speculative fiction with beautiful novels such as perdita street station, the city and the city and real sea. You may also know his nonfiction, which ranges from scholarly work on International Law and stylish esthetics. Essays in the quarterly journal to the book oct from 2017, which tells the story of the russian revolution. Were here today to celebrate his latest nonfiction book, a specter haunting on the communist manifesto published by haymarket. A specter haunting part critical companion, part literary exegesis. The book proceeds in six chapters elegant, economical then reproduces the manifesto and its many prefaces over time and space. I confess that until reading this book, i had not looked at the communist in many years. It inspired me to recover my First Encounter with this text in this in this slim book i bought at borders chain bookstore in tacoma, washington, in 1996. The receipts tucked inside. A specter haunting invites us to revisit that First Encounter with the manifesto. To examine it as literature. To place ourselves in the time that it was written. In february of 1848 and personalize its words to our lives and situations today. China considers the manifestos flaws and helps us appreciate all that it got right. In doing so, he offers what i see as a very loving and, lovingly assembled manual for all us who look around at the world we, have and imagine desire, wish to fight for something infinitely more habitable and humane. The agenda for today is ill be asking china questions that ive prepared and china will answer questions from the audience, which well be collecting throughout our conversation. And you can submit the chat function. Thank you so much for coming today. Thank you to the haymarket team for putting this together. And china, welcome. Thank you for this wonderful book. Oh, thank you. And thank you for such a lovely introduction. I thought we would just with the very basics. Can you say a little bit about what compelled you to write this book to revisit the manifesto in this way right now. I think sometimes it feels as if anyone who encounters any of marxs classics, particularly capital and the communist manifesto, feels driven to write about it because they have this enormous impact on on readers. But the specifics, i suppose there were couple of reasons. One is the every every generation, the the manifesto in new york necessarily, and theres something so particular to me having been political and politically active for decades about the bizarre febrile were in right now where, you know, theres so many absolute toxicities going on and and this complete Global Catalyst in terms of ecological crisis and mass extinction and so on. And at the same time, the kind of the sort of heartbreak and hope of of corbyn and sanders and so on and so so it felt like it like a very sort of, as i say, febrile moment in, which to say, you know, how do we now experience this in ways that are inevitably from how the great kind of anticolonial activists experience state or the you know, in the 1870s or whatever. Theres this theres something very specific about this moment and finally honestly i just theres sense in which i feel like reached the saturation point with irritation about the the pitiful bad faith and ignorance of the critiques of the manifesto and most. And the thing about that is i really i mean, i was very glad that you said in your introduction, you know, he mentions the flaws because. Yeah. I dont want in this book this theres no question i wanted to be very sort of rigorous and serious about saying like his its inadequate. This theres this is clearly not true this doesnt work etc. , etc. But whats remarkable is just the kind of the profound lack of curiosity as as the ignorance of most of the kind of liberal and conservative critiques. And and in a way, i kind of like the book is clear. No one is going to be surprised by my politics and read it, but its going to be clear where i stand. But i did also try to write it so that someone who completely disagrees me possibly can read it and can learn about the manifesto. Because if youre going to criticize it, you might as well criticize like at its strongest, you might, you know, like you might as well like not embarrass yourself with the scale of the attacks that have historically been leveled against it, which is just pitifully, intellectually uninteresting. So apart from anything else, just as a matter of intellectual good faith, i wanted sort of say, you know, lets talk about this specifically this document. Its time in our time. And as a document, you know, maybe we could start there with with those criticisms, even those bad faith criticisms. In some ways, it seems like and you you proceed this way in the text. Talking about liberals and critiques of the communist as a way of critiquing what they perceive to be communism itself as an ideology as a system of thinking as a political system thats deployed in the world. So what are they arguing that you consider bad faith . And that is actually quite right, that we can demolish in canada away with quickly. I suppose i mean, i would say, you know, bad faith and then theres just poor because there are some people who are who are offering, you know, good faith, arguments. But i think so. You know, so i tried to go into this some detail in the book, but, you know, some of the most probably the most common are and im very powerful ideologically, but also intellectually, completely vacuous and uninteresting. So you really engage with them very much other than saying, well, this is obviously absurd. So the classic one, which is like, dont be ridiculous. That is basically the sum total of the most common attack on come on on the comics is dont be ridiculous. And then if pushed, it becomes, well, you know, its common sense that this is that this is absurd and common sense is always an enemies of thought. Now, it doesnt mean that everything that think is common sense is wrong, but if think it just because its common sense, youre not about it at all. And throughout so much common sense has been overturned. Its common sense that slaverys best way to run society. Its common sense that women shouldnt have the vote. So this is this is just such selfevident. And what basically says is, i dont want to think about this. And so if you then make people think about it and you say, what do you mean, then it becomes, well, you know, are just always going to be selfish and you know thats a lovely idea, but youre just utopian. Yeah. And im and then its like, well, you know, what about the the mass behavior around the world of people supporting each other and being self sacrificing and so on . And i think a lot of conservatives think, again, good faith, bad faith. But on the left, we think everyone is lovely. Sadly im well aware that not everyone lovely. All you have to think is that Human Behavior is plastic. It changes. Its historically specific and that is it any surprise that people often, you know, with wonderful exceptions behave in sort of selfish and and selfish ways in the midst a system that glories in selfishness and rewards it and it and so on. So. So this is another just ahistorical on interesting question. The thing i think youre adverting to is this the fact of the stalinist regimes like put broadly, you know, you know arranging, from north korea to cuba to the soviet union, as was and this is an interesting one because critics can basically attack the manifesto and communism both on the grounds that they existed and they were basically pretty awful and they collapsed. And so they no longer existed. And so it couldnt work. So its like, you know, they were terrible. They failed. And again, this is where this is where there is either bad faith or just sheer ignorance. Because the fact is, you know, i know and anyone whos done the research that there for over a hundred years been serious, rigorous, fascinating arguments on the left, including the marxist, including the communist left on the nature of these regimes always been activists and hoax mushrooms and scholars saying this is not the right to be organizing things and this is not the model as proposed under, the classic texts of communism for the following reasons and so on. And what i want to say is, you, if youre a critic, you may disagree with that. But to simply act as if you know, as if is is what these regimes say it is, you know, and have no curiosity about the Critical Mass of debate on that is just so intellectually embarrass i see you know im and its like this is the equivalent me saying well you know didnt reagan say that the us was a, you know, a shining on a hill so clearly the us is a shining city on a hill right. What else is there to say about it . You know, its just the so, so again, as much as anything, its a plea to just have a serious discussion about it. You know what . Even if you end up disagreeing lets lets talk like grown ups. Well, yeah. And there are some other criticisms as well that i go into that i think are a little bit more serious and more interesting and so on. But but those are the ones that just make one roll ones i guess. Yeah. And i think that the historical one comes up all the time because people will say. Well, it seems good in theory, but you cant ever practice it right. And every experiment has failed. So i think thats thats quite helpful. Yeah. And there are, there are ways that that can be put in a more serious like there is, there is a position that will, you know, whatever the people on the ground think this is the inevitable of that political tradition for the following reasons now. Okay, now, now we can have a serious discussion about that, but mostly when people put it that way, they dont go into that. Whether through ignorance or lack of interest or, whatever. Its just, well, you look at north korea. Case closed, right . Yeah. And again, as as well as well as just being intellectually uninteresting and and so on. Its also personal insulting because these things are often presented as a kind of gotcha and its oh, yeah, i never thought that, you know, i. Yeah, exactly. Im curious, you could say a little bit about what the manifesto was written. So it is a manifesto that existed in a time and place and was produced for a purpose. You write about this was fun me as a journalist how you know behind on his deadline marx was in getting the manifestos together and sort of rush to the ending because he was behind yeah so what were marx and engels trying to do . Why were they making this . They were commissioned to write this document by the the communist league, which was this tiny Little Organization that they had become very prominent in and won over to their sort of their way of approaching things an organization of a lot of german radical expatriate workers among at one small current within the kind of small split current of the left and the 1840s. And it was it was an attempt to kind of lay out the sort of historic position. But what happened during the writing of, it was that revolution actually started to break out in europe and beyond. And this is where you get these amazing these these these these missives youre talking about where people are to marx and saying, you know, wheres that document you promised, thats and and and and its amazing because like it had an had a chance to sort of actually have a kind of a Material Impact to some degree within these amazing events that hed been hed been, you know, desperate. But because of what one writer rather beautifully calls his abiding brinkmanship with deadlines, he even that could not get him to get it in on time and his were basically sort of shouting at him. And as you say, the last chapter is incredibly truncated because hes clearly just like throwing it in the post to get it done in time its on so so its a document that has sort of slides across registers because it you know some ways its very its sort of trying to do a job of history. Its trying to do a job of recruitment. Its trying to do a job of explanation. And then all of a sudden it starts to become and more politically urgent through through the course of its own writing and you talk about sort of what communism meant at that time versus a term like socialism. I think in our contemporary political parlance is much more common. Sometimes theyre overlapping and of just start describing the same things. But it sounds like at the time socialism them meant something very specific that was distinct from communism and belonged to a certain class of people could you could you talk about that that distinction that something engels wrote later when he was discussing the manifesto . As he said, you know, at the time, we couldnt called it the socialist manifesto because basically his point was that socialism at the time of writing was it was an essentially kind of middle class position of that broadly encompassed any kind of social concern about the lot of the poor and could range, you know, could be extremely patrician, could be extreme in no way necessarily radical and so on but thats a to call yourself a communist put you in this kind of position of fidel party to traditions of you know, the extreme left of the of the of the french revolution example and this kind of, you know, a much more radical and rupture petrol politics. Whats interesting for me is that relatively quickly afterwards, they became much more relaxed about calling socialists or communists, sort of without, you know, and people can debate the specific meanings, but they lost a lot of that, which is partly why engels was explaining the context later. So it must that sharp distinction, i think must have begun to erode relatively fast after the after the publication the of the manifesto, because they themselves became less concerned about it. It was something you said in one of your articles was was that the young activists of today are quite unconcerned labels like communism. Yeah. Yeah. Which i, i was, i was really happy to read that because i hope its true and i, i was kind of, i suppose to a certain extent almost kind of pleasantly surprised because i do wonder whether there is still perhaps even more now than before something of a distinction between the two terms and that, you know, people dont necessarily bat an eyelid if you call yourself a socialist, but i think to call yourself a communist and get this is still my sense was something of a surprise. But is this an experience that youve actually had with like an activist being totally unconcerned about it . I think that is a small sliver of activists left, but i think its a its a prominent and important and i was noting that, for instance, the organizing of the first labor union at an amazon in the United States, in staten island, york, the core group included a member of the young communist who talked about how they were passing. 1930s literature on the organizing of the steel industry, famously by william zu foster, who was as a communist. And so there certainly is a sort of i would say theyre kind of avant garde of some of our organizing movements in the united, where communism is being kind of repurposed and re understood. But i think in the main, its what you say that there is still a stigma attached. And, you know, thanks Sanders Corbyn some of these other leaders its much easier to as a socialist or democratic without stigma these days communism still is. Yeah you and and you know even in the United States laws like when an immigrant is trying to put in applications. Right. You have to say you have no membership in the communist party or other totalitarian parties like this is still the language of of the law. Im curious in britain, how is communist im understood. Versus socialism say on the left . I mean, its extremely, extremely for someone to open, to identify as a as a communist and and again, i dont id much like the later ngos for the most part. I dont tend to get my nick at my nick is in a twist about this. I dont you know like i i think theres this odd theres this odd phenomenon at the moment which is the kind of which i would never have predicted it in a million years, which is the kind of the small but voluble kind of online meme culture of communism which i think, you know, so so if you had told me a few years ago that like the phrase fully automated luxury communism would like a phrase that resonated among young people, i would have thought this was completely insane. And yet there was recently ted talk about it, which is probably, if anything, evidence that its completely past itself. But yeah, maybe so do think and like a lot of that meme culture, theres this of oscillation between playfulness and provocation, teasing and trolling and maybe serious stuff and so on, and again, i dont have a problem with that at all. Think that i think that that that sort of unstable register is not in and of itself a problem. It can be quite fun and quite provocative and so on. But the problem that there is also a when, if youre going to talk more seriously or deeply about these things, its worth trying to unpick what. These meanings might be and and, you know, coming back to this seminal source text and this is partly why the the the epigram the book comes from Assata Shakur and ends up my book i mean and says and she ends up saying like essentially that she used to when she was asked what was initially she she was sort of denouncing it but then she realized she had no idea what it was. And she ends up saying only a fool that somebody else tell him who is enemy is which is partly this this play of saying lets actually talk seriously about what is said here rather than using it as a word like the boogeyman or something. Right. The one of the, the things that will stick out in peoples memories, those who have read the manifesto, the question around the abolition of property and you spend some time talking about what exactly that means and what exactly. And engels intended by that, because i think a lot of people you know it seems to shocking its so difficult to imagine its also sort of unclear what that means when i have to go and eliminate, you know, my attachment to all my books or my all my furniture, right . So down to that, these sorts of absurdities. So what does that mean and why is that a fundamental of what is laid out in the manifesto. Well, again, i mean the manifesto itself, i think this is something that cant be stressed. The manifesto form is crucial to this. And this is, as you know, one of the things i try and talk about quite a lot in the book. I think a lot of the a lot of the a lot of the criticism and indeed, in some cases the praise for the book is is misplaced because it doesnt really engage specifically the way manifestos work and what they in the way they use language and the reason i say this is because theres no question there are points in which like marks and angles in the most you splendid way sometimes are they can be real trolls and and they and they have and have a really kind of winning swagger certainly when it comes to property, you know probably my favorite line from the manifesto is theres this fantastic where they suddenly they suddenly the person and instead of talking in a kind of general sense, they suddenly start using the second person and theyre not talking to workers. Theyre talking to the bourgeoisie. Its amazing. Yeah. And they start saying, you do this, you do this, and they say at one point this wonderful thing, they say you reproach us with intending to do away with your property. Precisely. So that is just what we intend. And i love that you refusal to apologize. But as you say when you get into it, one of the things thats interesting about the manifesto is that it pretty explicitly were not talking about individual property here. Were not saying you dont get to keep your favorite pen as you say you can have you thats what were talking about here. Were talking about essentially, you know, the the essentially the kind of the means of production, the, you know, the the property of like the kind of generative engine of society, you know, is held in common rather than held individually for profit. And so this becomes so the question of property becomes about like not the stuff that you have in your pocket, but the stuff that makes the stuff that keeps the world going and is that and should it be owned and controlled by . A small group of individuals for profit at their behest using the labor, everyone else or communally decided this this notion of like communal hands, communism, you know, this is this is about like holding that kind of property in common. So thats a sense and as a corollary of that. Another thing that that theyre very clear about is this is this is not an ascetic communism. This is not a communism because there were traditions of communism that were sort of like, you know, we dont need all the stuff we have as long as everyones got a bowl of rice and, you know, and a roof, it and marx and engels have nothing to. They dont want that. They dont want asceticism, want the productive power of of of like, well, of capitalism but of put to the to the to the common weal. They so so its not just a question of saying, were not trying to take your know, as i say, your favorite books. Its also about saying and and you are allowed and and and youre going to were going to were going to increase the productive power. Were to increase, you know, like the this is a this is, if you like, a kind of prototypical, fully automated luxury ism. Rather than stared really, they dont envisage a world full of and nuns if you guys listen to china on chris hayess podcast he makes a very funny joke how marx would have been horrible and amazing on twitter because know there is this kind of tradition is built into this manifesto and the sort of general arguments style and so yeah and he was also he was he was not someone who have a particularly had much of a good sense of scale about the nature of of of arguments he was having. He will, you know, he will fully drop everything and write a 300 page book denouncing someone who it doesnt really matter that much about, but hes just really him in that moment, you know yeah. I think reading today that section of the communist manifesto where they go and try to destroy all of these sort of sectarian arguments and that we dont really have any knowledge. It feels very funny and, sort of disproportionate in times. I the you were talking about the manifesto as a form and trying to understand it that way and you start by really reading it as literature which very new for me honestly because you know, i think we all kind of encounter it through activism or Political Science class or something generally. Its for the arguments made within rather than looking at its lines. Its the way that its constructed and. Ill just say, you know, in the first section of the book, you say the text is prophetic, poetic, melodramatic and tragic the proletariat quote, nothing to lose but their chains. In the rush of capitalism, all that is solid melts into air at that famous line i think youre youre really engaging with the poetry of the text. Why did you want to do that . Why is that important to understanding the communist manifesto. For me, theres basically theres two important reasons. One is, again, simply, if like in terms of the history of ideas of kind of intellectual, good faith and curiosity, its worth mentioning that this document is stunningly beautiful and that you some of the passages are just extraordinary. And the the kind of the rhythms and the vatican register is just its its an important part of it. You know, there was just a very important book by Ludovico Silva published about marxs literary style and his metaphors and so on and these are constitutive and become very important in this text. But its not just for me. Its not just to say, hey, this is a really personally written book. Now lets get into the argument its also an attempt to as as i say, as you say to sort of look quite seriously about manifestos in general. And the way a manifesto works because seems to me that an enormous amount of the confusion about the manifesto, both from its enemies and from some of its friends comes from a sort of weird lack of curiosity. The way manifested as work and the thing about and i say, incidentally, that, you know, all texts, i think to some degree are unstable and are doing more than one thing, some more than others. The manifesto, much more than like, for example, a text book of logic. A manifesto is an extreme early playfulness kind of form. It has many voices, and its doing many things. So in the manifesto, in manifestos in general and and in this as almost the other manifesto of the moment period, right. It is at one and the same time sometimes in the same line. It is laying out a historical theory, laying out a sociological analysis, making political suggestions, desperately pleading with people to join them, trying to recruit people, showing off, arguing, for instance, on, etc. , etc. , and i do think this is important as more than just a literary thing because i mean, to give you one example, when you look at the when you look at the the the section on, theres this very notorious us line where they say the workers have no country and this is often being used as a as a as a way of saying you know, they dramatically underestimate the power of nationalism. And i think theres an element of truth that i think they were too sanguine. Marx and engels were too sanguine about the hold of nationalism. But the interesting thing about that line is that on the one like i think that that line not merely a statement of truth if if you if you offer it as just a statement of truth, then its clearly wrong or inadequate. But what its also doing, its its a demand. Its a plea, its a warning, part of its doing in the context of this document, which is designed to recruit radical workers, is saying to those workers, you should have no country if you are identifying with your country you are making a mistake and. If you understand the way a manifesto form works, then you can say, no, theres no flaws in this. You can say, okay, this is a point in which to have a serious reading of this, we have to understand the nature of this line and that maybe the accusation, it just thinks nations have no hold is not just not fully true, is exactly wrong to some extent. Exactly the anxiety about the hold the nation that leads to that line. And thats where this question of power poetry and the manifesto form comes in and i think is behind a lot of the the wrongheaded readings of what it says i love that of looking at each line trying to you know, see its many in tension not just meanings. Yeah and its question of late like i think a lot of the time arguments both again both for and anti are saying well are marx and engels saying this or are they saying this is and again i think like any text kind of both and and sometimes theyre contradictory and that doesnt mean that text is valueless and it doesnt mean its wrong and it doesnt mean or like wrong. And it doesnt you know what it means . Like a lot of texts this is doing more than one thing. So to analyze it, you have to sort of say, what are the what are the centers of gravity what are the kind of tidal movements in the text rather than, you know, what is the arithmetic argument in the text . Because it doesnt work that way. Mm. I was thinking as i was reading that section on the manifesto about how poisoned that word has become in the United States particular. I think because its so often attached to acts of violence and we have so many sort of Mass Shootings and awful things here, we say, oh, and there was this, you racist screed, this manifesto was found in the mans locker. This sort thing. Thats kind of how honestly, thats the term is sort of most commonly used heard in the news in the United States because of our culture of Mass Shootings, etc. And here were reexamining, as you say, this or a manifesto and appreciating all of the sort of beautiful potential in the forum and the way that a manifesto actually should be. This kind of aspirational document, you know, and rather than, you know what . But we see in these horrible reports that such an excellent point. And honestly, i havent occurred to me partly im not based in the states, so i dont you know, im not faced with that particular monstrous expression by capitalism nearly as directly you are. When i you know, think in britain, my, my hunch would be that like me, when when i hear the word manifesto, mostly what mostly comes to my mind is the communist manifesto. But i think typically what tends to come to peoples mind is artistic manifesto. Yeah, you know, the futurist manifesto, the surrealist manifesto, the symbolist manifesto, all of which in various ways drew very specifically on the communist manifesto, even if they were arguing with it. So yeah, it is a pity you really put thats a very thats a fascinating and very poignant thought, which is that to some extent, these horrifying screeds, the kind of children this im allowed to say that, by the way i am just the children of this extraordinary, beautiful text designed for liberation. Yeah. Sorry about my mike grim american edition there, but im. Its a really good point. And i literally just hadnt occurred to me, actually. Yeah im curious about you talk a little bit about religion, theology and also the manifesto as the sort of catechism, you know, sort of abiding structures of a kind of theology document. Theres a really beautiful anecdote in the book that you pull from Marshal Berman that honestly me tear up a little bit about the bavarian intellectual hans. Morgan though and margaret, though, is remembering how his dad, who was a doctor visiting workers in town and many of the workers were dying of tuberculosis and of them wanted to be buried with the communist manifesto instead of the bible. It was that level of of it held that power for them. Can you talk about that . You know, thats obviously just like an of the power of the document, but also how it can kind of displace or be in conversation religious texts. Yeah, im glad you had that reaction. I had exactly the same reaction to that that story is extremely beautiful. Yeah. Suppose i suppose this you know, anyone whos been on the on the far left for years will be accused of being a member of a and accused of, you know, sometimes, you know, varying degrees of truth but certainly the broad line attack that communism just a religion is is very common it seemed to me so part it seemed to me to be sort interesting to like to take this rather than just be defensive about this attack. Because this attack, it seems to me much like the attacks the the attacks on religion in general of the new atheists now kind of mercifully left behind by history new old. Yeah but right, right, right. Its you know, one of the things thats interesting to me about that attack is how ignorant. And again, im curious as it is about religion, what what is how does it work . And and that dovetails with a lot of points like people think is very hostile to religion because you know opium of the people and in fact, as you know that the full quote in which he talks about the heart of a heartless, the sign of an oppressed creature is exquisitely beautiful and deeply humane and deeply and deeply respectful. Marx, engels, particularly engels, very interested in the early history of religion and, not just interested academically a great deal kind of fascinated investment. Some of the early radical religious sects, but we when you have defenders of the manifest or indeed of communism sort of saying and like, oh, its just a pure slur, say that where religion is couldnt be more different and that, you know were scientific socialists. I always to say gently well you know comrade to be fair, the first draft of the manifesto was written by engels and it was called a communist catechism, you know. And it was it it was based on the classic ism of the church. And the form is exactly like, theres simply no way that there is not, among others a religious substratum to this. I dont see that as a problem because im interested in, in the way religion works. And i dont think religion as some people seem to, is merely an intellectual error. That seems to me to be, you know, an absurdly absolve you know, in recent years. Its also true that ive become i would say over the last personally ive become deeply fascinated by and moved by religion and theological writing and have gained an enormous amount. Philosophic from im approaching the such writings and that has i think to some sort of primed me to much more of a kind of open minded and generous and and i hope sort of humble in the sense of like having humility about traditions, trying to be respectful, to them, and partly is about the way i for me, i think a lot of it has to do with the relationship, the sublime to that is beyond words. And this is why, you know, the key aspect of, the if you like, the religious strata of the manifesto for me is not just an ethical a set of ethical claims and marks and angles. They said they didnt have ethical positions and they were wrong to be clear about it. Did. And thats fine. But also its its a question of apocalypse. Its a question of. Eschatology. Eschatology. And theyre the key if you like, i think the kind of the key category in the manifesto that distinguishes their communist some from even very kind of good and serious reformism is rupture what they like they use this amazing category of rupture the rupture with the everyday and this is a deeply this is im not saying its reducible to religion but im saying that its inextricable from a kind of apocalyptic sense of, you know, like these kind of millennial sects and so on, which was often an expression of kind of social agony and discontent, and this the seeking of kingdom of god on earth and thats why all of these threads kind combine into saying the attack that this is a religious text i do not think is doing the work think it is doing and that you know to say religion seriously as a way of thinking about know one doesnt have to agree every tenet of this or that theologian but like theres no question this is a text that is structured by a set of among other things, religion, adjacent concerns and sublime adjacent and and questions of affect and emotion and. And as i say, the beyond words and yeah. And so those kind of came together and i thought it was bit it for me its impossible to read the manifesto and, not feel the stirrings of feelings that one could that it is not a conceptual violence to relate to as similar to those people with deep faith feel about religion. Its really interesting. Yeah. Those words like a rupture or revolution. Obviously it raises sort of biblical images and the judeochristian tradition around the tearing of the curtain or the cloth and, you know, revelations and all of this. Im curious if you could say a little bit more about that that turn that you had about decade ago to being more open to these ideas in connection with the apocalypse. I know youre also obviously concerned about the environment and the sort of eco apocalypse. We find ourselves in, i think famously at salvage. You guys are made an argument, displace this language of anthropocene with i think literacy in and youre playing with some of these edge ideas and so what was it ten years ago that moved to reconsider some of this . Was it ecology or Something Else i mean as so often with intellectual and political trajectories the truth is i dont really know. You know, i mean, i can i can speculate on aspects biology and, you know, the the i mean, the loss of loved ones and things like that and a sense of sort, you know, political increasing sense of political desolation, increasing, you know, like and a kind of certain political homelessness. And im not saying im sure there are elements to all of that, but i would be lying if i could say to you like, heres why. And, and, and thats thats it. And i think, you know, i ive always liked ive always loved a lot of kind of religious literature and poetry because, as i say, for me, that sense of the unsayable and the beyond words, the sublime. Yeah, speaking, you know, the beyond words, the beyond language has always been important to me, both esthetically and politically and writing and theological writing, some of the most interesting takes on that, because it is so central to the to the set of concerns. So i think i started reading these as a way of finding writing that was taking that kind of thing. Seriously, i and trying to kind of approach it both philosophically and and and esthetically and, and it just kind of grew from there and i gained lot of intellectual and indeed political resources from a lot of this and ethical resources, a lot of this writing. Um, and i increasingly respectful of and fascinated by it. I think one of the things that i noticed when i was, you know, when i was interested in the sublime and i dont think this is a side note, i think this does very directly into the politics that the way some us experience radical politics. Yeah. So i was reading a lot of philosophy about the sublime and an interesting you know, with the capital s the kind of the romantic sublime and kind content that philosophically, yeah, you write that philosophical tradition of the sublime and which is obviously like, well, and one of the very interesting things about it and, im sure someone in the chat will tell me im completely wrong and give me a really useful reference. And in fact, i would love a such a reference, but broadly speaking, most of the philosophy i read have position that it said, you know, so the sublime when you feel kind of, you know, beauty tinged with horror, you feel this kind of awe. You cant put into words like picking out at a raging sea or whatever. And so they go into these enormous excursions, often very brilliant and very interesting the way this works. But very few of them engage with why why should humans react this way . What is this . And of the things about religious texts, whether you agree with them, disagree with them, whatever, is that that question of the why central to the discussion of the how the what. And so, you know, i am in the the read sublime it is it is the you know the read sublime that keeps me up a marxist a communist socialist. But to me part of that question, you know, even if its an unanswerable question, i think it is why should the signifying that we are feel our breath catch in our in our chests when you know stand on top of the mountain or when we hear dying workers beg for the manifesto to be put in coffin. Yeah. Why did that make you cry, right . Why did it make me cry . What an extraordinary thing. Yeah, what a wonderful thing. I think ive also had that experience, simplicity and in organizing, in moments where youre sharing this space and you know this might all fall apart, were sort of were trying something, you know, were pushing something and yeah, whether its at occupy in mutual aid, theres theres still these sorts of projects where you can come up to some experience thats very difficult to articulate and. Right, exactly. You know, that easy to articulate. I know. Yeah. What you mean. Yeah. While were on this topic of kind of coming up to towards rupture and revolution, theres this interesting part where you talk about reform in the communist which is not a word we generally associate with it and obviously one of the things that maybe we could say it got wrong was we didnt obviously slide head first into the eradication of the bourgeoisie and, you know, move towards Something Else but you know, theres this section where where you talk about how the manifesto actually is listing out steps that are good reforms that move us toward revolution and are part of our of a revolutionary despite actually sounding incredibly sort of banal. Were like too humble a high progressive income tax the i know thats my favorite one. I mean its yeah so yeah it say a little bit about you know why this list exists in the communist manifesto and how marx and engels were thinking about these stepwise pieces of the reference. Yeah yeah. You zeroed in on exactly the one that always makes me laugh because you have this incredible document thats like talking about sweeping the muck of history and the rupture and the revolution here demands high progressive income tax. Wow. You know what i mean . To be, to be and to be fair marks engels always said, like, basically from very early on, they said, like, dont fixate on the specific demands. And the demands were important in their time but like they say in the in the following they say like the specifics, the demands are not what you should focus on, because that moment has gone purpose of basically the way the reforms work for them. There is a there is a fundamental difference between reform maoism as a movement and socialism. And the funny thing is sometimes two might be pushing very, very for a very similar or even exactly the same reform. But the point is as as a part of what package of other demands and how because the point is, as i tried to say, marx and engels in the manifesto that theyre demanding these that had a certain in a certain context and that need to be specified for each individual context, not only because they will improve the life of, the working class, although they will, and that is a good thing to do, but because these specific demands, in their judgment, push up against the the sort of the permissible limits of the capitalism and kind of the entanglement that capitalism has has kind of extruded around itself in that moment. So that to grant this reform basically begins throw the whole system into into question because it can granted these are not like the demanded reform is not know abolish profit know it is you know it is possible capitalist capitalism cant be capitalism and abolish profit. It certainly can have, you know, the abolition of child labor and for universal education. But by instigating those measures kicking and screaming, if it marx under certain circumstances, particularly it has said very clearly it cant do it wont do it. What it also is it pulls against it to what to some extent, it shows the power, the working class. But thats not the main thing. The main thing is that it is under capitalisms own logic and and the the boundaries of that will be will be different in different and different times. And thats why you have in the in this moment of like early capitalism, you have this this rather underwhelming series of ten demands because those two have been pushed through at the time, know in the ways that they wanted to push them through, would have like really pushed the system up against its own limits and thrown it into and because because of what it was, essentially because of the bounds of the possible that it was projecting. And you you can see that very clearly. One of the things that was it doesnt i mean, sadly, it doesnt automate basically translate into mass radicalism, but it can and like when you have comrades, you know, one of the interesting things about the the and im hardly the only person to point this out is you have literally decades of neoliberalism saying, you know, cannot provide this, you know, safety net demanding its literally impossible things dont work that way. And then in a matter of days theyre pouring more money into a furlough scheme than than would have been imaginable a week and a half earlier and so on and so one of the one of the few things that that kind of gives me that has given me hope, the sort of the sclerosis and the brittleness, american capitalism and particularly american neoliberalism which has in its in its lack of a of a welfare state and a work of en masse workers for some time. And a poor workers party. Is that the boundaries of it considers permissible and possible or claims to be, you know, permissible and possible. So constrained that are relatively victory can actually really throw the system into question. The reason one of the reasons that the demand universal health care in the states is so vital is not just because it will end the truly mass barbarism, the American Health care system, but because if youve had this system saying for well, even if we wanted to, we cant write a unit. I know thats everyone watching the the stream knows thats. And when we eventually prove that its. That, that alibi of is and isnt possible is punctured immediately. And that is the nature of the revolution of reform. Yeah. And it seems, i mean from what i just read about politics in the uk also that, that is why people on the left so passionate about the National Health care system there and are trying to save it, you know, from these politics of austerity. Absolutely. And theres a danger here, which is that theres a deep i mean, you know, much like a manifesto and much like any political any text, there is very very rarely a kind of. Simon pure political phenomenon. So ultra leftists enjoy pointing out quite rightly that like you know the welfare state was, you know was was, you know, a negotiation the government to waylay concerns and that you know this all perfectly true and if and you know the massive social good of the welfare and the National Health service was very very real but it was not without political ambivalence. Thats perfectly true. But the to the question is to make a political judgment in the moment and at the moment collapse of i think even at the time it was set up as certainly no you know the collapse of the nhs at the moment which is terrifyingly imminent and and something that is being pushed very, very hard in this country would be such a political defeat for for us that and conversely the converse of that is they are pushing so hard and they are making it as if the crisis its in is so much a matter of just like the that theres nothing you can do about it, that to to defeat that agenda and to, you know, bolster the nhs and to save it and to get the money that, you know, we demand for it. And so would be a real political triumph. Again, doubtless not its ambivalences. Welcome to being human, but nonetheless is called triumph. Yeah. And i and i like the way that you one is keeping people alive im pro that well exactly i was just going to say because i think you make this really elegant point in the book, which is, yes, all of this this sort of, you know, this play of logic revolution, but also and engels, are people existing in a world with factories and death immiseration. And they actually if people are living or dead or healthy, you know, or sick. Yeah. And so these reform, they do save lives and you have to be alive. Yeah. And its Something Else, right. Yeah. And, and you know, you see it, i mean funnily enough to some degree less in the manifesto than in some of their other text. But when you read some of the descriptions in capital or you read, you know engels is you know excoriating beautiful brilliant condition of the working class the sheer disgust and rage and its obverse is which is this love love of what could be this despot yearning. I think you know, yearning i think i think i for me at least to be to a socialist is to is to yearn and you cant yearn unless you want and you want things be better. And and they they wanted things to be. And i think everyone listening to this does to china. Im going to just ask one more question and then and then start pulling in some audience questions. But have a question just about your relationship to to book and other works of nonfiction, you know, you are known, i think primarily as a writer of these beautiful of speculative fiction. Why do these sorts of projects . Because a lot of these ideas of marxism that weve been discussing today are already quite apparent in your novels. I like i like the idea i was theres a theres an implication. So well, you didnt need to write this. If we thought. Absolutely. But all i mean, i guess its funny the way you formulated because to me to its precisely because fiction like on the one hand, anyone who knows anything, anyone who reads my fiction, i think, let alone if know anything about me, is probably going to be able to put together reasonably clearly a sense of i stand on certain things, not because try to be sloganeering in my fiction. I very much dont i dont in fact, a lot of fiction i dont like is i dont like it because i think its too heavy handed politically, but because i think the sense of my concerns and my approach, the world and so on. But when youre doing, you have this great luxury, which is that you dont have to you have you can raise questions and ideas and so on without excluding basically answering them not merely to be evasive, but because you dont necessarily know or because thats the, the point of the book or because the question and the uncertainty is precisely the esthetic that youre trying to communicate it or whatever, whereas when i want to make a political argument, it seems to me theres a big difference between ruminating on political ideas and like trying to put together a coherent political argument. And to me there is i, you know, i make no claims about the other people can do things. But for me there is actually no replacement if project is to make a clear political argument than to do exactly that. Hence writing essays and nonfiction and so on. And why . Because i because i think because because its a constitutive part me and because. Because is distracting to live in this world and and i would love to i would love to not i would love to just write, you know, silly books about, monsters and and know try poetry and all that kind of thing. But i think i think i think it can be, you know, its very distracting and very necessary to try to understand the world and to try to understand the world as part of an agenda of trying to change it. And so i dont have a more coherent answer than that, really. Its its its yeah. All right. Well, we have some really wonderful questions from the audience thanks to jordan and john from haymarket moderating these. And i think these really show also how excellent haymarket readership is. Heres one from a person who has already read the book china bill nevins writes, you make some astute comments in the last of a specter haunting about the impact of the covid pandemic on american neoliberals, capitalism and the topic of hate. Hate was sort of on our list of things we wanted to talk china but didnt quite get to. Why do you talk about hate in this book . What you trying to accomplish with that . Im basically are the that section kind of stems from a long running very comradely and close debate that i have had with a friend for a long about about the nature of hate and it seems me that there is a there is a very strong kind of antihate ideology and propaganda in modernity and this idea that you at the same time is its a system that throws hate willy nilly and and and rewards it in certain contexts. But to explicitly say you hate something political is and i think this is particularly the case in the states with its fetish civility. Yeah. Although trump has changed that a bit, i dont know. But anyway, this notion that it is unseemly to say that and its like, you know, look were all for improve the world and so on. But like you talk about hating a system, you know, thats not helpful. And so and thats section was borne simply out of me being i dont want to be ashamed of hating things and i dont want i dont want to be hate shamed. And it seems to me im not saying you have to hate. What im saying is and draw in the book on a lot of writers who who i did some research and i found like, again actually says that this is an area which some of the theological and resources are very useful, but that if you hate as a social phenomenon is inevitable and not only in the sense that it is purely utopian in the bad sense to think, to imagine World Without hatred at the moment, you cant imagine getting rid of hatred in this world. And many of us will hate all kinds of things. And given that its inevitable, seems to me very unhelpful or to make anyone feel ashamed for anything is inevitable. It doesnt mean that anything you feel is okay. It depends. But you know, if this is not like you aristocratic, this is not due to us, there will. My point is, this is where the ethics comes in. If you have hate does not equal hate does. Not equal hate. Like its not its not a single phenomenon. The hatred for, you know, the hatred for an ethnic minority is not commensurate with the hatred of an exploitative system and not the same thing. Even if the emotion of the person in that moment might look the same, they might like angry in the same way. Its not the same social phenomenon. And if are this is where i draw a lot anger was in the condition of the working class because he he talks very clearly about the trap of individual hate says you know you know this is not about hating individual people its very sometimes its difficult not to but thats not thats not going to help you its going to hurt you. But like, if you if you have an analysis, as i do, in which this enormous amount of social is a result of this system, that explicitly says human need is born in it to profit. If thats your analysis and if you have an ethics by which human life human liberation human human flowering is a good. And if you have for analysis and analysis in which all of those things are crushed under an extremely lot of dynamics who. Would you be not to hate who would you be . Not to say this is a hateful system and i hate it. So partly that section about hate is a way of saying, you know i, im not ashamed this partly because for me, hatred been very, very politically motivating. And and so thats thats really where where that came from. I think. Thank you. Heres a question from josh. I try to it so that its not just you know me i mean there are there is a interesting and very beautiful and i think very yeah as i very beautiful literature on like the lack on hate and and the necessity of all the the unashamed hate and particularly when you start to think of it as an obverse love i you know i hence my partial defense. I think i enjoy that section and heres a question from joshua freese, who is a union bus driver. Joshua says, ive seen coworkers grow in militancy through struggle, but rarely join discussions of left politics. Was the manifesto read widely working class people when published. Its a really excellent question i mean to be glib the i mean some sometimes one one of the things that so fascinate about the manifesto is the way its reception kind of ebb and flowed so as a rough and ready as a rough and ready at moments of like great political discontent, let alone struggle interest in the manifesto translation, sales, etc. Surged. Its a its a remarkable kind of barometer of of of, well, discontent and but also, i think of yearning. I think its a barometer, yearning. And one of the things that, you know, the kind of collapse of the social imaginary, one of the things it does is says, you know you have nowhere to go with your yearning it to yourself. So the moment that theres a sense in which that yearning might have an outlet, then people are accosting around for him. So i think its always been a question of, you know, much like now there will be kind of small minorities of of workers indeed of other people who will be explicitly interested in the manifesto and so on and degree to which they can have wider among the working class depends very on the wider social circumstances, you know, how much as, as, as as the great italian anarchist malatesta put it, you know how much people are capable of wanting how much you know. And if people are capable, if people are allowed, if there are the resources to want and yearn, then i think more people to come to it. Its always been a minority current, theres no question about that. But i think but i think that thats the of the ebbs and flows. One of the points about and im sure that the question and knows this joshua yes im sure joshua knows this but. You know theres this classic thing is if you if you give people a list like, you know, do you support this . Do you support this . Do you support and then and then at the end, you know, are you a socialist, loads of people will say, no, im not a socialist. And yes, i support, i think you said the socialist matches. So i think i think theres probably a difference between saying and, again, the moment is going to be whats important here as well as, you know, your own relationship with people. Theres a difference between sort of trying to kind of, you know, have debates and arguments and share these ideas and so on with people who are implacable opposed to the specific like the specific processes. And if you like, policies and programs of any kind of redistributive, let alone socialist, let alone communist movement. Thats one thing. But then theres very much another, which is essentially to kind of to kind of point out to people or to to learn for yourself that people actually are way more left wing, if you like, than lot of them think they are. Now, i think there is still very important about kind of identifying. So im not saying therefore it doesnt matter, just leave it. But i am saying its a different kind of debate and its a different kind of struggle. So this is a long winded way of saying it. You know, it was never read at a kind of mass level, but certainly there were when it was, you know, an important and influence or voice in the working class movement. Heres a question from someone whose screen name is labor creates all wealth. What should todays socialist include in todays manifesto and the questioner gives an example. For example, know should it address political things like having a more democratic constitution . But maybe ill put it to you just more broadly. Try and i like if you were to write such thing, what would it have in it. Im going to be really annoying and thank you. Its a question im going to be really annoying and im going to duck it by saying like, you know, i wouldnt write it because i think i think its in the nature of any document that it has to be collective, has to be democratically designed. So can i can spit out some ideas, but i i really dont want to be read as saying these are programmatically what i think because is exactly the kind of thing one should have a debate about. And i might something forward and you might point out to me why that wouldnt work and i might change my mind instantly exactly the process we need. I like that, the questioner has focused some political things because i do think there can sometimes be some of some wings of the radical movement, can be a little bit dismissive, some of the political stuff and sort of see it, you know, like really its kind of workplace nothing, you know, its kind of, you know, soviet or nothing. And im all for soviets. Let me be very clear about this. Im all for workplace organizing, but i think that the particularly and crucially in a non revolutionary situation when you are precisely trying to put forward radical reforms that stretch the limits of the existing system. I think that form is is very much is important and an important part this so off the top of my head, i say, you know the us in some ways is easier to answer that for because the us this this historical particularity of like not having really a meaningful welfare state and not having a a party and so, you know, absolutely instantly first thing on my agenda universal health care thank you. Now you know immediately after that you know very strong rent controls, i think. Yes, absolutely. Abolition of the Electoral College, abolition of half of the you know, the appurtenances of the lets be clear, deliberately system of quote, democracy in the u. S. I mean, and im not saying anything that any serious scholar the constitution doesnt know. You know, this is not just a of, you know, filthy read point. I mean its its quite explicit. You know, the Electoral College exists to be this is not a crime. Its not a controversial point. So i would say, like some things like that and simply simply, you know, being intransigent on these points so this is not there may be things in which in a non revolutionary situation you know you you do a bit of horse trading and you know but no, you know the Electoral College goes the Supreme Court, you know, lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court goes through etcetera etcetera. So and for me in this country, i mean, sure, get rid of the house lords. Rid of but but its harder for me to say i would need, i would need to think, i mean obviously like people probably know where are parliament is pushing through a bunch of extraordinary antiunion laws at the moment and that would you know thats the thing that is jumping to my head right now personally little bit of a personal shibboleth here. One of the things i would do in britain as a a radical reform overnight, i would ban private schools. Hmm. I think that would have an. Yeah. Well, i think would have an enormous impact on on British Class society in particular. And it certainly wouldnt eradicate capital ism. But the particular nature of the private school nexus in this country. I think that that you know if wealthy i, i would i would like to extend that to private health care in this too. But particular private schools, if if wealthy people that was they were forced use the Education System of the local school system. I think it would have an enormous impact on on on britain and someone is going to point out that as a child i went private schools and they are going to that i am a hypocrite and i am going to say to them, i did not choose which schools i went and that is not what hypocrite means. And there is absolutely no logical contradiction between having been a system and wanting to destroy it. Very good. Heres question from david birger, who asks if you could talk a little bit about socialism as conceived by marx and engels in time and contemporary socialism, or a social Democratic Politics or however you want to characterize, how would marx and engels look at our socialist organizations that we have now. I mean, thank you for the question, david i let me im to come at this backwards that the final part of the question you know would marx and engels look at the socialist organized of today. I want to sound a note of caution about this, because i dont to put words into the question his mouth. Im not suggesting that this is this is their point. But i do worry sometimes that one of the ways that we try to kind of, if you like our politics on the on the marxist left is to say well what would marx and think . Lets do that. And the shorthand get it of course. But the point is the point is a marx and i could be wrong about things. B its perfectly possible to have like, you know, an interpretation of a broadly sort of marxist method and come to a different conclusion. And from that very philosophy about a particular system or situation, come to a different conclusion than marx himself may have. And so i about the sort of the shibboleth, if you like, of to kind of find, i think, you know, one true line that would be the one true thing they would say. So would say briefly, i dont really purport to know and. Im fine with that. I and i dont think that the search for what they would say really the best way for me to think relating to political movements. I mean they were both i think the marx and. Tended to be pro probably somewhat more optimistic about the chances for you know revolution so on than certainly i would be today i think they tended to underestimate the the resilience and the the adaptability of capitalism and combine that with the fact that they were i think quite rightly, quite explicitly always committed to revolutionary change, rupture or change. They they were not dismissive about reforms, as weve said, but, you know, they were interested in sort of revolutionary organizations. And what that would mean is that know the sort avowedly non revolutionary, a socialist left in the states, so on, its very easy and yeah, correct. As far as it goes. As a as a marxist to say, well, heres where i disagree with this and the other. But thats a very its a very sort of shallow and i think unhelpful way of of of proceeding. I mean i have a the the abstract level, you know, the the distinction in, you know, socialism and contemporary kind of democratic socialism, whatever. I kind of im sorry to im sorry to, david, because im not going to answer this question very well, because i think as weve tried to say, one of the things about socialism a term is that it can mean an awful lot of things. And i, i think the way i would approach is to Say Something like, you know, take Bernie Sanders like, do i have differences with bernies politics under outwardly . A ton of them, not least. Im committed to rupture politics and, you know, and i have disagreed with some of positions on International Issues of economics and this, that and the other. And so on. Okay. So fine. And i think its very important to be clear that and to be honest about it and to have hopefully comradely discussion about it and so on, do also think that sanders and, you know, the squad and so on, of all of whom i have, you criticisms and with whom have some individual differences too. I think that they have been, you know, if you like a kind enriched shining a foundation for, socialism, whatever it means across all these different definitions in us, absolutely undoubted, oddly and a certain extent, i think what im simply trying to say is, you know, the classic kind of clear against sectarianism and to just again, i dont want to suggest that the question of is being sectarian, but there is a way of interpreting english in a sectarian fashion and in the very Old Fashioned definition, sectarianism rather than starting by focusing on differences, start by focusing on on know comradeship, start by focusing shared agendas. And by all means about differences where and when we must. So i am aware. Thats a really unhelpful. Answer. But i you know, i specifically in the book did not present a program of my own thoughts in any but the most general and nebulous way. And some people criticized me for that and fair enough. But that was quite a deliberate choice because. This is not a book that is designed to be a political intervention in that direct way. Its a book thats designed to be a political intervention at a more sort of general level, you know, heres a question that gets a little bit into what we were talking about around your fiction, but we have a very big fan of marks and your fiction. Robyn goodman china and robyn asks how marxism relates to your Fiction Books like potatoes street station and embassy town. I know that youve already that youre not doing a sort of heavy handed or deliberate, kind of like, you know, argumentative politics in your novels. But maybe theres you could talk a little bit about how that thinking maybe inflect some of the or characterization in those books. Well thank robyn. I think. Im not being im not being coy when i say that think in many cases i might be the last person to know and the worst person to offer to answer. Because i do think i do think that its a fallacy to think that writers understand their own work better than anyone else. Again i know youre not saying this, but some people do. Ive plenty of writers tell people that their readings of their works are wrong because thats not what they meant. And i think. I hope we can all agree that who gives . What you mean. The question is what the question is what the work is doing. You know, now what i can say, and this is an analogy ive used before, so please forgive me. Im repeating myself the way i relate to it is this i my head is a a pot and its filled with loads and loads of ingredients and theyre just like bubbling around all the time and when i am writing a book. Im spooning things out into bowls from the same pot. Only have one pot and its all the same stuff thats in there and its all mixing together and all being heated together. But i spoon them out differently and i lay them out differently and i might fish for some ingredients more than others for fiction, for nonfiction, but inevitably they flavored each other and so on. So i have. The most explicit level, you i like to put sort of little jokes or easter eggs or whatever, some of the fiction. So, you know, if you are if you are interested in marxist philosophy and you do happen, read my kids book on london, you make a raise, a wry smile. The fact that there is a fairly clear altuzarra joke in it, but if youre not, it doesnt matter know and thats not the most explicit of beyond that. Its like as weve talked about the sublime yearning class struggle, beauty, hatred all mixed around and spooned out differently and the and the basic difference is im spooning and this is the metaphor completely breaks down. But im writing nonfiction. Im spooning out ingredients with an attempt to make a particular as i say, the metaphor breaks down. Whereas if im doing nonfiction, im trying to kind of make the most and sort of whats the word of subtle and surprising stew that i can but its all the same ingredients theyre just doing different. We talked a little bit about the line about the worker. No country or should have no country. And a question from the audience. The manifest do ends with the call for workers of all countries to unite. Is that realistic today . What would look like today. I mean, i would say that it is not only realistic, it is necessary. And i think i think if if if our program is to the world, if our program is to cleave, to liberate, and to allow the full development of humanity, see, then, if this does not happen internationally is not happening. So i would turn question on its head. No, you know, so no, not realistic. Neither is a socialist revolution realistic. Neither is rapture or politics realistic. Neither ism you know is a National Health care system in the us. Realist tech. None of this is realistic. We are not. We are in the business of changing what is realistic. Our job is to change. Our job is to push and push and. Push until certain things that are realistic become realistic. You know, you know, female suffrage was not realistic realistic. The thing with the the the actually the thing was, as i say, i think it has to be put the other way round you and to say that you know that works for countries to unite doesnt mean like you know its a monday you have a revolution there are no countries on the tuesday thats not how were talking about it but it is say that or autarky in a in a global the manner this is not just me. The manifesto is very clear this autarky in a global economy, in a global context is not sustainable. You might be able to limp along for a while, but you are not going to survive that simply as an economic level at a political level. You know, i am not free when anyone is in chains, you know, if i can, to quote you, tell me you wrote something very, very about you talking very specifically about unions, union nationalism and internationalism nationally, focused unions versus internationalism. You had this wonderful phrase, which is you said, what good is a fortified island, a thrashing sea . And i thought that was so beautiful and and and so point, so i guess i guess to the question or i would say i would say nothing is none this is none of this is realistic and all of it is necessary. Yeah. Such a beautiful way to end this time together. China, thank you so much. Youre such generous and inspiring, conversational host and i hope everybody order this book and well get it from their bookstore. It really is such a wonderful and refreshing way to encounter the communist manifesto. So thank you very much for being with us, everybody. Thank you to john and anthony and jordan for putting this together. Thank you, china. Congratulations on the book. Thank you so much. Recently stacyship was a guest on booktvs in depth. She has chronicled the lives of cleopatra, Benjamin Franklin and others. During her appearance, she accounted the salem witch trials and discussed her most recent book about samuel adams. Host want to read a quote from the witches. Americas tiny reign of terror the, salem rresents one of the rare moments in our enlighten past when the candles are knocked out and everyone seems to be groping about in the dark. The place wre all good stories begin. Easy to caricature, it is the only tragedy that has acquired its own annual unrelated holiday. It is more difficult to comprehend. What happened . Guest which end would you like me to start with . Host anywhere you want to start. Guest i think halloween seems to be our theme today. What happened is early in 1692, in january, two little girls one 9 and one 11 in a ministers house begin to exhibit signs, bark and yelp and shudder and alternately paralyzed and unable to speak and alternately speaking in what appear to be nonsensical terms and throwing themselves into fireplaces and falling down wells. And no one can quite figure out what these symptoms are really meant to convey. Medicine in 1692 massachusetts was fairly primitive, although epilepsy was known about. These were not end leapt aric epileptic systems. There had been a few years earlier an outbreak of witchcraft which had been really well described in a best selling book, and those symptoms and these symptoms were identical. So fairly soon thereafter no one rush ares to an immediate diagnosis, but several weeks after these girls begin to exhibit these signs and after they have spread to another household, they diagnose it as witchcraft. And this is in the house of a minister, so its particularly difficult for people to comprehend, particular particularly important that its in the household of a minister. The girls would have obviously felt more on display as the ministers daughter and niece. And the diagnosis of witchcraft is suggested, obviously a witch needs to be found. And somehow in the subsequent weeks fingers are pointed, three women are named as suspects. And thats january to february 1692. Very quickly those three women are deposed. Two of them say they have no idea, theyre innocent, this was obviously not of their doing. They are, i should say, the three most likely suspects. One is a local egg beggar woman host that was sarah good . Exactly. And being quite unplease sent if they didnt unpleasant if they didnt give her what she wanted. She was going to burn down their barn, shes married but shes on lousy terms with her husband. The two of them are known to fight with each other. Theres a small child with her, and she had recently paid a visit to the girls at the parsonage and seemingly terrified them. The second was sarah. Ossoff born who had been disputing a will for some time, so made herself somewhat unwelcome in the community. And the third, and we dont have an explanation for why the third woman is named, she was an indian slave in the ministers household who would have known these girls intimately, would have prayed with these girls, eaten with these girls, probably slept in the room with these girls, and shes the third person named as a potential suspect. Sarah osborn and sarah good deny all intimacy with witchcraft, an extraordinary, immensely colorful confession. And, of course, as soon as someone has confessed to witchcraft, then the witchcraft trial is set this place, and fingers begin to point left and right. Watch the full Program Online at booktv. Org. Just search in depth or stacy schiff. And youve been watching booktv. Every sunday on cspan2 watch nonfiction authors discuss their books. Television for serious readers. And watch them all online anytime at booktv. Org. You could also find us on twitter, facebook and youtube