International Socialists

What makes a book good or bad?

Is it all down to personal taste, or is there more to it?

 

Some people turn up their noses at pulp fiction, forgetting that even their darling Shakespeare wrote for ordinary people, not professors. Other people say there's no such thing as a good or bad book, but if a writer or a musician is popular they automatically assume they're brilliant.

 

I'm pretty certain there's a difference between good and bad books, though I can't always say why. Sometimes a good book will be easy to read, sometimes difficult, some will be tragic, some funny, some written in the language of angels and others scratched in the mud by a half-literate monkey.

 

Three things do matter though: a good story, honest characters and optimism. Optimism is the magic ingredient that makes a story work politically. It doesn't mean there has to be a happy ending, just that there could be a happy ending. Lack of optimism makes George Orwell's 1984 a squalid, untruthful book - in direct contrast to We, by Yevgeny Zamyatin. We is more hopeful than 1984 and also more tragic. It delivers a bitter political rebuke to the Stalinist regime in a way that Orwell in his despair could never do. How honest the characters in a book are usually tells you how much the author cares. Most blockbuster characters are pretty two-dimensional, fun to read once, but you won't learn anything about life there. And a good story?  That's because books are for enjoying if you can, like life.

 

 

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

The Communist Manifesto

One of the best storybooks ever written. Marx and Engels wrote some heavy stuff, but they also understood how to communicate. The Manifesto is short. If you find it intimidating, then skip the intro and get straight into the story. It's like a journey through time as Karl and Friedrich strip back the chrome styling of history and have a look at what's under the bonnet.

 

It starts from the basics, like any good story: food, warmth and shelter. How we get them tells you how society works. The Communist Manifesto also tells the story of the conflict at the heart of human history. It's got a monster, the Insatiable Profit Motive, and heroes - you and me. But don't treat it like a rare and perfect flower, grab a red pen and scribble all over. Ask those old men the hard questions: Did you think about the environment, Friedrich? Aren't you being a little sexist here, Karl? And guys, is the economy really the same now as it was 150 years ago? Adapt it, adopt it, bring it into the 21st Century.

 

 

Robert Tressell

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists

In some ways this book is the opposite of the Manifesto. Instead of a grand overview Tressell writes about the daily struggle for survival. It's not stylishly written, but it's brutally realistic and completely absorbing. The author worked as a house painter in 19th century England, and he saw first hand the way capitalism extracted all it could from working people. Like Tressell's own life, this book has no happy ending, but to read it is to appreciate the victories of past generations, and recognise the same parasitic patterns today - whether you're a house painter, a nurse, or a computer technician.

 

 

James Baldwin

Go Tell it On the Mountain

James Baldwin tells the story of another side of struggle - growing up black in the wealthiest land in the world. Nothing I have read better describes the racist disease, and the way it communicates itself through society and across generations, destroying lives as it goes. Baldwin's work is controlled, even clinical, but driven by fire, his vision acute and his style brilliant.

 

Everything of his I've read is good, but start with No Name in the Street, essays about the turbulent 1960s and 70s. Baldwin writes about the struggle against racism from first hand, from Martin Luther King's non-violence to the Black Panthers. These stories are inspiring, because the people in them keep surviving. No matter how brutal the system, or how much their lives seem locked in, they never give up. Baldwin's only optimism is his honesty though. Struggle is a grim necessity, and hope only exists because you need it to keep fighting.

 

 

V. I. Lenin

The State and Revolution

To be frank, the strategist of the revolution doesn't really cut it in the storytelling department, and the characters in State and Revolution are either geniuses who agree with Lenin, or numbskulls who disagree - but what glorious, abundant optimism! He knows full well the grim necessity of struggle but he also knows the best way to go about it. So optimism flows into action, instead of souring into despair. Why read it? Because you might be critical of the system, but strategy is vital. If you've got it wrong, you're lost. Again, though, pull out the red pen: Lenin's not St Paul to Marx's Jesus. He wrote this book as part of a debate at the time, and to grasp it you have to join in the argument. Scribble in the margins, trample on it, burn it in a fit of rage, go and buy another copy, share it with your friends.

 

 

Giovanni Guareschi

The Little World of Don Camillo

Stories of Italian village life, with a parish priest for the hero? What's that doing in a socialist mag? Quite simply, because they're wonderful stories. Guareschi was writing in the 1950s and 60s, at the height of the Cold War, when Italy was split between communism and conservatism.

 

Guareschi was no fan of Stalin, but he understood and loved Stalinists, like the village mayor, Peppone, who spends his days in constant rivalry with Don Camillo, belting each other with benches, or hoarding machine guns, or best of all humiliating the other. It's good when you're sick of ideology and political infighting because at the end of the day, Peppone and Don Camillo knew that sharing a bottle of wine with a friend is what really matters. Guareschi's no Marxist, but he has great respect for the good sense of ordinary people, and these stories overflow with the milk of human kindness. What's more, they're online at: http://members.tripod.com/~vajrang/littleworld/