Interview | Toussaint Louverture: The Story of the Only Successful Slave Revolt in History
Matthew Cookson interviews the authors of a new graphic novel on the Haitian Revolution.
The Old Lie
The First World War ended 100 years ago today, on 11 November 1918. Four years ago, Matthew Cookson looked at how poetry of the period reflected growing resistance to ruling class justifications for war. Now he returns to the theme to explore how struggles over how it is remembered have continued to this day. One […]
The radicalism of Shelley
Artists are creatures of their time, and Jacqueline Mulhallen’s new political biography of Percy Bysshe Shelley captures this. His poetry is a true expression and celebration of love, beauty and the human spirit.
Condemning the slaughter of the ‘Great War’
2014 marks the 100th centenary of the beginning of the First World War. Britain’s rulers want us to commemorate it as a ‘just war’. Matthew Cookson argues that cultural representations of the war, often from soldiers’ perspectives, are an explicit condemnation of our rulers’ justifications for the slaughter. Before he was so cruelly defenestrated as the […]
Why does Michael Gove hate Blackadder?
Today marks the 100th anniversary of Britain declaring war on Germany in the the First World War. Cameron, Gove and others want us to remember it as “just war”. But Matthew Cookson argues that cultural representations of the war are an explicit condemnation of our rulers’ justifications for it, and often an implicit critique of […]
Lambeth College strike: Stage One ends, but prepare for Stage Two
by Matthew Cookson, UCU lead negotiator, EHWLC (personal capacity) Strikers at Lambeth College in south London marched back together to work today (Wednesday 9 July) after five and a half weeks of all-out action. The college lecturers have pledged to resume their strikes in the autumn term if the dispute is not resolved. The UCU […]