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Post-op report

Dear friends, I’m back home after a week-long spell in the Royal London Hospital recovering from seven hours of surgery on my lower spine. The experience proved arduous, as grueling as it sounds, but the good news is that I’ve survived and should draw tangible benefit from it. What happened was that the revlimid therapy… Read more

Spare us the “positivity”

Reading Owen Jones’ Guardian tribute to Stephen Sutton, the teenager who died this week after raising £3 million for a cancer charity, I found myself becoming more and more perturbed. In fact, downright angry. Jones’ tribute was heartfelt and I am in no doubt that Stephen was an admirable young man who made a genuine… Read more

The Times They Are A-Changin’ – fifty years on

The Guardian, 22 February, 2014 Fifty years ago this month, the 22 year old Bob Dylan released his third album, The Times They Are A-Changin, the acme and as it turned out the end of his “protest” period. Dylan renounced this genre so quickly, and took his fans on such a giddy journey afterwards, that… Read more

Past visions, future dreams

Contending for the Living Red Pepper, February-March 2014 Last spring, I made the steep climb to the mountainside entrance to the Cuevas de Covalanas, one of several caves in the Cantabrian region of northern Spain decorated with pre-historic paintings. I had seen reproductions of this type of art in books, but nothing prepared me for… Read more

“On the Waterfront”: doubts and reflections

After watching ‘On the Waterfront’ this afternoon for the first time in ages, I was struck by the film’s mix of strengths and weaknesses, but most of all, I have to say, by the severity of the latter. Brando’s subtle, supple embodiment of the protagonist is legendary for good reasons, and the surrounding performances justify… Read more

Rescatar el pasado para construir el futuro

Spanish translation of Red Pepper column ’1200 BC: The world’s first industrial action … rescuing the past for the future’ Translated for Rebelión by Christine Lewis Carrol La ciudad de Luxor, en el sur de Egipto, fue noticia en Gran Bretaña a finales de febrero con ocasión de la muerte de 19 turistas en un… Read more

Iain Banks’s announcement: memento mori and wake-up call

The Guardian 6 April 2013 Receiving a cancer diagnosis, and with it, at times, a harsh prognosis, is inevitably a strange and disorientating experience. It poses awkward challenges for everyone concerned – doctors, patients, loved ones. There is in the end no one “right” way to breach news of this kind, which in any case… Read more

From the pyramids to Tahrir Square

The Hindu 6 April, 2013 Like travellers since Alexander, we started at the pyramids. After a spell in Cairo’s medieval quarter, followed by a visit to the New Kingdom tombs and temples in Luxor, we ended in Tahrir Square, where we joined thousands in a demonstration against President Morsi and his government. On the eve… Read more

1200 BC: The world’s first industrial action … rescuing the past for the future

Contending for the living Red Pepper, April-May 2013 The city of Luxor in southern Egypt made the headlines in Britain at the end of February, when 19 tourists were killed in a hot air balloon accident. That tragedy will compound the woes of Egypt’s tourist industry, once a major source of employment and foreign currency,… Read more

The man who went beyond a boundary

CONTENDING FOR THE LIVING Red Pepper, February-March 2013 When CLR James’ Beyond A Boundary was first published fifty years ago, the sociology of sport and the politics of popular culture had no place in the academy or on the left. The book had to create its own subject, define a new field of intervention. James… Read more