“The State and revolution” was written by Lenin in 1917, after events in February had overthrown the Tsar but before October when Bolsheviks took power. Sean Sheehan It was an intensely political interregnum and dangerous too: Lenin had become a wanted man, with a reward of 200,000 roubles […]
Book reviews
A photographic memory of Palestine before the Nakba
The Nakba, the dispossession and expulsion of Palestinians by Israelis in 1948, in the words of Mohammed El-Kurd “breathes down our necks, invading our national identity and contorting our earliest encounters with our sense of self”. Sean Sheehan He writes this in the foreword to the 2024 edition […]
Antigone’s monstrous protest
“Antigone”, an ancient Greek drama, tells the story of a dictatorial ruler, Creon, and a woman, Antigone, who challenges his injunction that her deceased brother, Polyneices, cannot be buried. Sean Sheehan Antigone and Polyneices are the children of Oedipus and, because she tries to bury her brother, her […]
Lenin, Gaza and Ukraine
When Rosa Luxemburg dismissed the idea of Polish independence and laughed at the idea of an independent Ireland, Lenin replied in “The rights of nations to self-determination” (1914) and referenced Marx’s support for Irish republicanism. Sean Sheehan Lenin’s championing of anti-imperialism grew stronger and “Imperialism and the national […]
Room 16 in London’s National Gallery
The painting by Fabritius that features in the opening pages of Laura Cumming’s “Thunderclap” – it could be said to be the inspiration for the book – is to be found in Room 16 at London’s National Gallery. Sean Sheehan It shows a man sitting at a street […]