Partisan • Patriotic • Internationalist
Produced by Azzy O’Connor, Fiadh Tubridy and Declan Mallon, The Rent Strike (2024) documentary was shown in the Irish Film Institute in August. Screening across Ireland are being scheduled at the moment, with a growing public interest across all generations. The Rent Strike uses archive footage, newspaper articles, personal archives […]
John Mayall died on the 22, July 2024, aged 90 years, at his home in Los Angeles. He was not concerned with fame or celebrity status, and was content performing clubs and smaller venues. He continued to perform until his last live performance in March 2022, at The Coach House, […]
The French Revolution sparked great hopes for the rise of the bourgeoisie, the abolition of feudal structures, and the establishment of a capitalist society. Napoleon centralised power in his person, established an authoritarian regime, and crowned himself emperor in 1804. His wars in Europe served both territorial expansion and the […]
Hotel Lux: An Intimate History of Communism’s Forgotten, by Maurice J Casey – review Richard Mullen The blurb on the back cover of Hotel Lux reads: “A series of romances wrapped in a detective story, disguised as a narrative history of international communism, Hotel Lux uncovers a world of forgotten […]
Newslessness is a bilingual poem in Irish and English by Gabriel Rosenstock, in response to a work of art by the influential German artist Hans Haacke. Hans Haacke, News, 1969 (Fair Use) Newslessness What a day! a day like any other day a day full of news but unlike the previous […]
Ransom ’79 (dir. Colm Quinn, 2024) is the story of Charlie Bird working on his final documentary, about a demand to extort £5 million from the government or foot-and-mouth disease would be unleashed into the south of Ireland, back in 1979. This is a true crime story, that remained covered […]
On Tuesday 25th June, the LGBT committee of CPI’s Dublin branch organised a screening of the East German film, Coming Out (dir. Heiner Carow, 1989), with party members and members of the public in attendance. Coming Out was the last film produced in the GDR, by the production house DEFA, […]
Spy thrillers about and accounts of East-West spying during the cold war abound, are always written from a particular Western political standpoint. Autobiographies relating the stories of former “agents for peace” on the other hand are rare. Beatrice Altman-Schevitz’ The Shadow in the Shadow is the only such memoir to […]
East German Literature: Challenges and Triumphs in Cultural Recognition Germany’s minister of state for culture, the senior Green politician Claudia Roth, one of the almost exclusively West German-born government officials, voiced her surprise at a recent literary event upon discovering that there were other books on East German (GDR) bookshelves […]
Maya Wind’s Towers of Ivory and Steel: How Israeli Universities Deny Palestinian Freedom saw its Dublin launch at Trinity College, mere minutes after the Trinity students celebrated the end of their encampment. The book launch was a chance to contextualise the euphoria of one of the first wins for the […]
The M-C-C’-M’ circuit means Money (M) which is exchanged for Commodities (C) – including labor power which also becomes a commodity in a capitalist society – involved in the production process to produce a value-added commodity (C’) which is sold for more Money (M’), and thus the accumulation of capital […]
In a departure from the usual week-long run of events, this year’s James Connolly Festival ran from Thursday to Sunday, culminating on 12th May: 107 years to the day that Ireland lost its greatest martyr and Marxist theoretician, James Connolly. It was at the outbreak of war in Europe during […]
This year’s James Connolly festival opens on Thursday 9th May 2024 with a panel discussion titled ‘Land And The People’. We ask the question: what is our relationship to land and resources? We’ll be joined by Sinead Mercier, Patrick Bresnihan, Róisn Ní Chinnéide and Rory Rowan. Friday 10th May will […]
Duke Ellington, a prominent figure in music and cultural history, especially in jazz, died fifty years ago on May 24, 1974. Edward Kennedy Ellington was born into a lower middle-class family in Washington on April 29, 1899. His mother was the daughter of a former slave. Ellington’s childhood was marked […]
George Gordon Lord Byron was born in London on 22 January 1788. In 1794, he inherited the title Baron Byron on the death of his great uncle, and was titled Lord Byron in 1798. He attended Harrow and went on to study at Cambridge in 1805. Here he published his […]
Until we Fall: Long Distance life on the left is a fascinating and sometimes inspiring account of decades of political engagement. The words Until We Fall distil the essence of six chapters into three words. Until We Fall suggests a commitment that is unwavering and a purpose all consuming. Anyone […]