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'Drop the Glass Industry': Collaborating with E.H.Carr

“Carr and I first corresponded in 1955, after he had borrowed my thesis on The Development of the Soviet Budgetary System. We met a year later in 1956, when he gave a seminar in Glasgow, where I had my first academic job. In January 1958 he proposed that . . .” read more

The Path to Rooted Freedom

“Struck yesterday, as I leafed anew through Gide’s journal, by its religious aspect. It is primarily a Protestant self-examination, and then a book of meditation and prayer. Nothing in common with Montaigne’s essays, the Goncourts’ diary or Renard’s journal. The basic thing is the struggle against sin. And . . .” read more

Karl Marx’s Children

“In the winter of 1845–6, during which Marx worked with Engels on The German Ideology, Mrs Marx’s brother, the unsatisfactory Edgar, came to stay with the family in Brussels. Though she had disclaimed tender feelings for him, and disapproved of this inveterate sponger of no settled occupation at . . .” read more

E.H.Carr--A Personal Memoir

“In valedictory speeches, and in one or two obituaries of E. H. Carr, the authors—independently of each other—described him as enigmatic. This struck me, and I asked myself why this very English historian seemed so enigmatic to some of his close professional colleagues. In Britain he became, towards . . .” read more

The Death of the 'Chief Ideologue'

“Many Soviet politicians have attracted the attention of the world’s press over the last ten years but very little has been said or written about Mikhail Suslov. He kept himself to the shadows, shunning all publicity. He served neither as a minister nor as Deputy Chairman of the . . .” read more

Wittgenstein’s Friends

“Searching for an epigraph to his Philosophical Investigations, Ludwig Wittgenstein considered using a quotation from King Lear: ‘I’ll teach you differences’. ‘Hegel’, he once told a friend, ‘always seems to me to be wanting to say that things which look different are really the same. Whereas my interest . . .” read more

'Teachers, Writers, Celebrities': Intelligentsias and Their Histories

“The appearance of Regis Debray’s Le Pouvoir intellectuel en France was a major cultural event in France. Critical reaction was instant and passionate; the book was soon a talking-point and—on a scale appropriate to a book of its kind—a best-seller. But if the public evidence pointed straightforwardly to . . .” read more

The Tragedy of the Althussers

“On the morning of Sunday 16 November, Hélène Althusser, wife of philosopher Louis Althusser, was found dead in their Ecole Normale flat in the rue d’Ulm. The philosopher, in a state of complete delirium, accused himself of strangling her. The college doctor, Etienne, and the deputy director had . . .” read more

Herbert Marcuse

“The sad news of the death of Herbert Marcuse has reached us as we send this issue to press. The highly original and critical intelligence he brought to Marxism, and his unstinting solidarity with those in need of it, will be sorely missed. His life spanned the epoch . . .” read more

Moscow Winter 1934

“We had arranged to meet on the boat and travel together. I was part of an Intourist package to see the November celebrations in Red Square and Desmond was to give a series of lectures in the University of Moscow. We thought that we would somehow wangle for . . .” read more

'The Memory that works backwards only...'

“Osip Mandelstam was one of the most original and powerful Russian poets of the pre-revolutionary and revolutionary period, who might have left an even deeper mark on modern Soviet literature if in the last years of his life he had not been cruelly hounded by Stalin and driven . . .” read more

'Lettres a T. Briant et C. Valence'

“Max Jacob: Lettres ` T. Briant et C. Valence.” read more

'Prisoner of the British'

“Prisoner of the British: Yuji Aida. Translated from the Japanese by Hide Ishiguro and Louis Allen. The Cresset Press. 30s.” read more

Hugh Gaitskell

“He had scarcely drawn his last breath, when the halo was stuck above his head. It was like some preposterous historical mistake. Who would have believed Hugh Gaitskell fit for such an exalted place in the national pantheon? Who, dredging through the speeches and few writings of this . . .” read more

'Radcliffe'

“Radcliffe. David Storey. Longmans, 21s.” read more

Nazim Hikmet

“Nazim Hikmet spent one third of his adult life fighting for a socialist revolution in his native Turkey, one third in jail and one third in exile. Now he is dead. Very few in Britain can have felt anything at the news. Very few can have known who . . .” read more

Reply from 'Survey'

“March 13, 1963.” read more

Communication on 'Survey'

“We have received the following communication from Marcel Liebman. We print it as a matter of interest to readers.” read more

C.Wright Mills

“I mourn the death of C. Wright Mills, bitterly and personally. We had, in the last five years of his life, become close friends. I am not minded to write a detached appraisal of his work and thought. But I think I can write about the man he . . .” read more

Tribute to Camus

“only six months ago, only yesterday, one asked: “What will he do?” Provisionally torn by contradictions which must be respected, he had chosen silence. But he was one of those rare beings for whom one may well wait, because they choose slowly and remain faithful to their . . .” read more