Fiction or Non-Fiction, academic or casual, theory or non-theory, feel free to mention books of any genre and on any topic.
Took a break from reading theory for a while to finally read For Whom the Bell Tolls by Hemmingway. Absolutely loved it, realised though that i should probably read some non fiction on the spanish civil war at some point.
Now reading The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein. This was gifted to me by a comrade a while ago but i just never got round to it until now, so far though I’m enjoying it, he did warn me about its constant attacks on china. Curious on where Naomi Klein falls politically tbh
Klein is a liberal who doesn’t like neoliberalism.
Hahaha that seems to line up with what i’ve read so far. Would you say the book is still worth reading?
For liberals who believe in capitalism and are scared of socialism? Yeah. For socialists who already know about the mechanisms of capitalism and how privatization ruined Eastern Europe? Not much.
Fair enough. I’ll probably pass it over to someone else I know then, it was gifted to me years ago when i fresh out of high school and just barely getting into socialism so i’m probably past needing to read it. I’ll update this thread with whatever I choose to read instead
If you wanna be notified for the upcoming weekly threads, just reply to this comment with ‘yes’ or ‘y’. I will assume you want to be added to a notification list. If you want to be removed from the list, you can reply to this or DM me.
yes
I’m at the end of part 4 of the New Jedi Order series of Star Wars. It’s called Agents of Chaos I: Hero’s Trial. Not to be confused with the upcoming Disney movie. It is an entirely different storyline that Disney sadly has abandoned despite there being 19 novels in this storyline alone.
I want to read the novelizations of the main saga sometime. I’ve heard prequels are actually great in book form.
Almost all the novels are pretty great and give you some real expanded lore to discover. It’s quite a lot of books though so just choosing some timelines at a time is recommended.
I want to stick to the novelizations of episodes 1 - 6 for now, whether I want more or not I’ll decide afterwards.
I have not been reading as much lately as I’ve developed an addiction to chess and studying/practicing that. I will try and re-instate my “reading before bed” habit this week as I want to finish Losurdo’s book on Stalin.
This reminds of the time Marx got addicted to Chess. His friends and acquaintances would often visit him at his London exile-home, and they would have day-night long marathon chess sessions. Marx would have the classic gamer rage after losing games against Engels and Karl Liebnicht. It finally stopped after Jenny banned the chess gatherings at their house because Karl was becoming insufferable.
average chess player tbh
Yeah I have to agree, luckily I’m not like that since I know it’s a game and don’t take losses to heart.
Didn’t know that Marx had an actual chess arc, I only heard that Lenin sometimes played chess and also threa tantrums when he lost apparently.
Capital vol 3. But also Unequal Exchange: Past, Present, and Future by Torkil Lauesen to procrastiread.
I’ve taken a short break from reading and studying theory. In the meantime, I’m reading Love and Limerence by Dorothy Tennov. It’s nice and simple yet I often get distracted with past ruminations relevant to the book. I will be writing a review and will post it once I finish reading it.
Been reading state and revolution :3
Grover Furr’s The Mystery of the Katyn Massacre: The Evidence, The Solution.
I really like his approach. He specifically set out to determine the guilty party based on “unimpeachable evidence”, i.e. the evidence that could not have been falsified. And just on the basis of that the conclusion becomes obvious.
After presenting all of that evidence in detail and showing how it couldn’t have been falsified, he then spends the rest of the book digging into how the proponents of the “official” narrative contort themselves to ignore or dismiss all of that evidence and often just straight up knowingly lie.
I really recommend this book to anyone who accepts the “official” Soviets-did-it narrative, as I’ve unfortunately seen some comrades in this space do. Both the argument and the writing style are very clear.
I also strongly endorse this recommendation. The worst argument i hear on this topic even from leftists is: “but Russia apologized for it in the 90s”. Are we forgetting that the modern Russian Federation is an anti-communist bourgeois state? And that even before, Khrushchev’s “de-Stalinization” involved making up all sorts of fake atrocities and slander that have since been debunked? “Khrushchev Lied” is another very important book to read in this context.
I’ve been reading some Black Panther Party articles. They are pretty short. This one paragraph resonated a lot with me since I’m a crakkker:
One of the criticisms of white militants and radicals is that when we view the masses of white people […]; we view in reality 180 million racists. The sensitive white intellectual and radical who is fighting to bring about change is conscious of this fact, but does not have the courage to admit this. When he admits this reality, then he must also admit his involvement because he is a part of the collective white America. It is only to the extent that he recognizes this that he will be able to change this reality.
From The Basis of Black Power.
