Subjects Archives: Literature

At what point does an individual stop supporting the lesser of two evils?  The question became particularly important this primary race, as one man ascended to political stardom ostensibly breaking free from the evils of mainstream politics and creating a platform based on hope and change.  This transcendent figure is presidential hopeful Barack Obama. Searching […]

  This year marks the seventieth anniversary of C.L.R. James’s The Black Jacobins: Touissaint L’Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution.  This classic account of the Haitian Revolution of 1791-1803 is one of the greatest books in the twentieth century.  Its title refers to the Jacobins, the most radical element within the French Revolution who propagated, […]

  Music by Checkpoint 303 <http://checkpoint303.free.fr/> Haitham Sabbah, an uprooted Palestinian, was born in Kuwait on 2 April 1969.  He lives in Bahrain now, married with three children.  This is a video that Sabbah created to help end the siege of Gaza.  Read Sabbah’s blog at <http://sabbah.biz/>. | | Print

I have been asked to speak on ‘Future of Socialism’. What I am going to say is based on my recently published book, Crisis of Socialism — Notes in Defence of a Commitment, which may be referred to for the detailed argument in support of the propositions I am going to advance with the help of passages culled from this book. I am going to deal with the question in four separate but interrelated segments of my address.

  “O there are times, we must confess To harboring a whim — we Like to picture old Karl Marx Sliding down our chimney” — Susie Day“Help fund the good fight.   By contributing to MR, you help reinforce the left and reclaim the future.” — Richard D. Vogel“To do my part, I just got […]

Ashok Mitra is a former Chairman of the Agricultural Prices Commission and Chief Economic Advisor of the Government of India.  He was the first Finance Minister of the Left Front Government in West Bengal in 1977, and a former member of the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament.  He has been a […]

Interview with IRNA Information Agency and Iranian State Television and Radio ABBAS ALI HADJI PARVANE: In the name of Allah!  Mr President, we are very grateful to you for finding the time to give us this interview in spite of your busy schedule and to answer our questions on Russia’s international position and bilateral relations […]

  The Future Is Unwritten A Film directed by Julien Temple, Vertigo Films, in association with Film4, Parallel Films, and Nitrate Films. Cinema Release May 2007, DVD due September 2007. One night a movie saved my life.  How?  By reminding me of what’s important, by re-kindling the excitement and motivation of a time I thought […]

A Ramallah l’enfant éventré par une bombe à fragmentation me regarde les yeux mi-clos comme pour me dire « Pourquoi ? » In Ramallah the child blown apart by a fragmentation bomb looks at me with his half-closed eyes as if to say “Why?” This poem was posted to assawra by Djamal Benmerad, an Algerian […]

  Visit Alistair Hulett at www.alistairhulett.com. Alistair Hulett‘s “The Internationale” is included in his Dance of the Underclass, available from AKPress. | | Print

  Ron Jacobs is the author of the first comprehensive history of the Weather Underground: The Way the Wind Blew: A History of the Weather Underground.  His articles, essays and reviews have appeared in CounterPunch, Monthly Review,  MRZine, Alternative Press Review, Jungle World, Works in Progress, State of Nature, and a multitude of other places.  Ron […]

JASMINE AND STARS: Reading More Than Lolita in Tehran by Fatemeh KeshavarzBUY THIS BOOK Fatemeh Keshavarz, author of Jasmine and Stars: Reading More Than Lolita in Tehran, on how literature can be used to create or destroy stereotypes. Q: How did Jasmine and Stars: Reading More Than Lolita in Tehran come to be? A: You […]

All roads may have once led to Rome, but, for the Palestinian people, all roads lead to checkpoints.  The latest checkpoint to block the Palestinians is not manned by Israel but the ostensible mediator of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, the Quartet (which is composed of the United States, Russia, the European Union, and the United […]

Cada poder hegemónico en cada tiempo establece los límites de lo normal y, en consecuencia, de lo natural.  Así, el poder que ordenaba la sociedad patriarcal se reservaba (se reserva) el derecho incuestionable de definir qué era un hombre y qué era una mujer.  Cada vez que algún exaltado recurre al mediocre argumento de que […]

OPERATION AJAX (a game of skill and chance) FEBRUARY 14 THROUGH MARCH 10 Wednesdays through Saturdays 8:15 PMWHERE EAGLES DARE 347 WEST 36TH STREET (between 8th and 9th avenues) 1, 2, 3, A, C, E to 34th Street 13TH FLOOR BLACKBIRD THEATER $18 RESERVATIONS: (917) 916-1307 JAY SMITH as CIA Senior Officer KERMIT “Kim” Roosevelt […]

  G.M.S.: Here in Tucson, Arizona, 70 miles from the border, we are feeling the effects of President Bush’s deployment of National Guard troops at the U.S. border.  The first hundreds arrived last summer, and 2,500 are expected to be in our “Tucson Sector” by August.  Moreover, the Border Patrol is to grow from 12,400 […]

Annual Fundraising Appeal Friends of MRZine and Monthly Review! The continuing existence of MRZine and Monthly Review depends on the support of our readers.  Unlike many other publications, we make all new Monthly Review articles, as well as MRZine articles, available online, free of charge.  We do so without drawing any advertising money at all […]

Annual Fundraising Appeal Friends of MRZine and Monthly Review! The continuing existence of MRZine and Monthly Review depends on the support of our readers.  Unlike many other publications, we make all new Monthly Review articles, as well as MRZine articles, available online, free of charge.  We do so without drawing any advertising money at all […]

Annual Fundraising Appeal Friends of MRZine and Monthly Review! The continuing existence of MRZine and Monthly Review depends on the support of our readers.  Unlike many other publications, we make all new Monthly Review articles, as well as MRZine articles, available online, free of charge.  We do so without drawing any advertising money at all […]

  This world — a banquet of flowers just above hell. Kobayashi Issa was born on 15 June 1763 in Kashiwabara, Shinano Province (Shinanomachi, Nagano Prefecture today).  Denied his inheritance by his stepmother and stepbrother, he made a living as an impoverished traveling teacher of poetry.  The language of his poems is as simple and […]