Left Book Club
Encyclopedia
The Left Book Club, founded in 1936, was a key left-wing institution of the late 1930s and 1940s in the United Kingdom set up by Stafford Cripps
, Victor Gollancz
and John Strachey to revitalise and educate the British Left. The Club's aim was to "help in the struggle For world peace and against fascism". Aiming to break even with 2,500 members, it had 40,000 within the first year and by 1939 it was up to 57,000.
The book club
supplied a book chosen every month by Gollancz and his panel — Harold Laski
and John Strachey — to its members, many of whom participated in one or other of the 1,500 or so Left Discussion Groups scattered around the country. Contributors included G. D. H. Cole
, André Malraux
, Katharine Burdekin
and Clement Attlee
, George Orwell
, Arthur Koestler
, John Strachey, Clifford Odets
, Edgar Snow
, Ellen Wilkinson
, R. H. Tawney
, Léon Blum
, J. B. S. Haldane
and Stephen Spender
.
The books and pamphlets with their distinctive orange (paperback 1936–38) or red (hardback 38–48) covers with their legend — not for sale to the public — sold for 2s 6d to members. Many titles were available for sale only in the LBC edition, with monthly 'choices' received by all members, with additional optional titles reprinting current socialist and 'progressive' classics. The volumes included history, science, reporting and fiction and covered a range of subjects, but all with a left-leaning slant.
Until the Nazi-Soviet pact of 1939 (and indeed for some time afterwards), the club's output included many authors who were members of the Communist Party of Great Britain
or close to it, and it avoided any criticism of Joseph Stalin
's Soviet Union, refusing Orwell's Homage to Catalonia
. Indeed, it published some extraordinary encomiums to the wonders of Stalinism, among them Dudley Collard's Soviet Justice and the Trial of Radek and Others (a defence of the show trials), Pat Sloan's Soviet Democracy (a propagandist tract extolling Stalin's 1936 constitution), a reprint of Sidney and Beatrice Webb
's Soviet Communism: a new civilisation, J. R. Campbell
's Soviet Policy and its Critics (notable for its virulent assault on Trotsky) and Hewlett Johnson
's The Socialist Sixth of the World.
By early 1940, however, Gollancz had broken with the CP, a process documented in the articles collected in Betrayal of the Left
in early 1941, and from then on the club took a strongly democratic socialist line until its demise in 1948. Despite its large membership and popular success the Book Club was always a huge financial drain on the publisher, with the advent of paper rationing at the onset of the war the club was restricted to just one monthly title. To replace the book club's additional choices and augment the LBC selections, Gollancz launched the "Victory Books" series, a series of shorter monographs available to the general public, including two of the biggest sellers of the War: Guilty Men by Cato (Michael Foot
) and Your M.P. by Gracchus (Tom Wintringham
).
In addition to books, the LBC also produced a monthly newsletter — with began as a simple club news sheet Left Book News, but gradually developed into a key international political and social affairs paper (as Left News).
Gollancz was a notoriously interventionist editor. He published Orwell's The Road to Wigan Pier
but insisted on prefacing its account of working-class life in the north of England with an introduction disowning its criticisms of middle-class socialists who had little understanding of working class life and later republished the book leaving out the second part of which he disapproved.
In 2006, Ed Miliband
MP started the Left Book Club Online as a successor to the original Left Book Club with the aim of stimulating debate around left-wing ideas and texts, but not publishing new work. The website now appears to be defunct.
A small group of booksellers in the UK are working on bringing back a publishing version of the Left Book Club and established a Limited company of the same name in 2002, their site LeftBookClub.com was launched in 2007, where they are documenting progress.
Stafford Cripps
Sir Richard Stafford Cripps was a British Labour politician of the first half of the 20th century. During World War II he served in a number of positions in the wartime coalition, including Ambassador to the Soviet Union and Minister of Aircraft Production...
, Victor Gollancz
Victor Gollancz
Sir Victor Gollancz was a British publisher, socialist, and humanitarian.-Early life:Born in Maida Vale, London, he was the son of a wholesale jeweller and nephew of Rabbi Professor Sir Hermann Gollancz and Professor Sir Israel Gollancz; after being educated at St Paul's School, London and taking...
and John Strachey to revitalise and educate the British Left. The Club's aim was to "help in the struggle For world peace and against fascism". Aiming to break even with 2,500 members, it had 40,000 within the first year and by 1939 it was up to 57,000.
The book club
Book sales club
A book sales club is a subscription-based method of selling and purchasing books. It is more often called simply a book club, a term that is also used to describe a book discussion club, which can cause confusion.-How book sales clubs work:...
supplied a book chosen every month by Gollancz and his panel — Harold Laski
Harold Laski
Harold Joseph Laski was a British Marxist, political theorist, economist, author, and lecturer, who served as the chairman of the Labour Party during 1945-1946, and was a professor at the LSE from 1926 to 1950....
and John Strachey — to its members, many of whom participated in one or other of the 1,500 or so Left Discussion Groups scattered around the country. Contributors included G. D. H. Cole
G. D. H. Cole
George Douglas Howard Cole was an English political theorist, economist, writer and historian. As a libertarian socialist he was a long-time member of the Fabian Society and an advocate for the cooperative movement...
, André Malraux
André Malraux
André Malraux DSO was a French adventurer, award-winning author, and statesman. Having traveled extensively in Indochina and China, Malraux was noted especially for his novel entitled La Condition Humaine , which won the Prix Goncourt...
, Katharine Burdekin
Katharine Burdekin
Katharine Burdekin was a British novelist who wrote speculative fiction dealing with political, social, and spiritual issues. She was the sister of Rowena Cade, creator of the Minack Theatre in Cornwall. Many of her novels could be categorized as feminist utopian/dystopian fiction...
and Clement Attlee
Clement Attlee
Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee, KG, OM, CH, PC, FRS was a British Labour politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951, and as the Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955...
, George Orwell
George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
, Arthur Koestler
Arthur Koestler
Arthur Koestler CBE was a Hungarian author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest and, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria...
, John Strachey, Clifford Odets
Clifford Odets
Clifford Odets was an American playwright, screenwriter, socialist, and social protester.-Early life:Odets was born in Philadelphia to Romanian- and Russian-Jewish immigrant parents, Louis Odets and Esther Geisinger, and raised in Philadelphia and the Bronx, New York. He dropped out of high...
, Edgar Snow
Edgar Snow
Edgar P. Snow was an American journalist known for his books and articles on Communism in China and the Chinese Communist revolution...
, Ellen Wilkinson
Ellen Wilkinson
Ellen Cicely Wilkinson was the Labour Member of Parliament for Middlesbrough and later for Jarrow on Tyneside. She was one of the first women in Britain to be elected as a Member of Parliament .- History :...
, R. H. Tawney
R. H. Tawney
Richard Henry Tawney was an English economic historian, social critic, Christian socialist, and an important proponent of adult education....
, Léon Blum
Léon Blum
André Léon Blum was a French politician, usually identified with the moderate left, and three times the Prime Minister of France.-First political experiences:...
, J. B. S. Haldane
J. B. S. Haldane
John Burdon Sanderson Haldane FRS , known as Jack , was a British-born geneticist and evolutionary biologist. A staunch Marxist, he was critical of Britain's role in the Suez Crisis, and chose to leave Oxford and moved to India and became an Indian citizen...
and Stephen Spender
Stephen Spender
Sir Stephen Harold Spender CBE was an English poet, novelist and essayist who concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle in his work...
.
The books and pamphlets with their distinctive orange (paperback 1936–38) or red (hardback 38–48) covers with their legend — not for sale to the public — sold for 2s 6d to members. Many titles were available for sale only in the LBC edition, with monthly 'choices' received by all members, with additional optional titles reprinting current socialist and 'progressive' classics. The volumes included history, science, reporting and fiction and covered a range of subjects, but all with a left-leaning slant.
Until the Nazi-Soviet pact of 1939 (and indeed for some time afterwards), the club's output included many authors who were members of the Communist Party of Great Britain
Communist Party of Great Britain
The Communist Party of Great Britain was the largest communist party in Great Britain, although it never became a mass party like those in France and Italy. It existed from 1920 to 1991.-Formation:...
or close to it, and it avoided any criticism of Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
's Soviet Union, refusing Orwell's Homage to Catalonia
Homage to Catalonia
Homage to Catalonia is political journalist and novelist George Orwell's personal account of his experiences and observations in the Spanish Civil War. The first edition was published in 1938. The book was not published in the United States until February 1952. The American edition had a preface...
. Indeed, it published some extraordinary encomiums to the wonders of Stalinism, among them Dudley Collard's Soviet Justice and the Trial of Radek and Others (a defence of the show trials), Pat Sloan's Soviet Democracy (a propagandist tract extolling Stalin's 1936 constitution), a reprint of Sidney and Beatrice Webb
Beatrice Webb
Martha Beatrice Webb, Lady Passfield was an English sociologist, economist, socialist and social reformer. Although her husband became Baron Passfield in 1929, she refused to be known as Lady Passfield...
's Soviet Communism: a new civilisation, J. R. Campbell
John Ross Campbell
John Ross "Johnny" Campbell , best known as "J.R. Campbell," was a British communist activist and newspaper editor. Campbell is best remembered as the principal in the so-called Campbell Case...
's Soviet Policy and its Critics (notable for its virulent assault on Trotsky) and Hewlett Johnson
Hewlett Johnson
The Very Reverend Hewlett Johnson , was an English clergyman, Dean of Manchester and later Dean of Canterbury, where he acquired his nickname The Red Dean of Canterbury for his unyielding support for the Soviet Union and its allies.-Life:Born in Manchester, the third son of Charles Johnson, a wire...
's The Socialist Sixth of the World.
By early 1940, however, Gollancz had broken with the CP, a process documented in the articles collected in Betrayal of the Left
Betrayal of the Left
Betrayal of the Left was a book of essays published in 3 March 1941 by the Left Book Club, edited and largely written by Victor Gollancz.Other contributions included two essays by...
in early 1941, and from then on the club took a strongly democratic socialist line until its demise in 1948. Despite its large membership and popular success the Book Club was always a huge financial drain on the publisher, with the advent of paper rationing at the onset of the war the club was restricted to just one monthly title. To replace the book club's additional choices and augment the LBC selections, Gollancz launched the "Victory Books" series, a series of shorter monographs available to the general public, including two of the biggest sellers of the War: Guilty Men by Cato (Michael Foot
Michael Foot
Michael Mackintosh Foot, FRSL, PC was a British Labour Party politician, journalist and author, who was a Member of Parliament from 1945 to 1955 and from 1960 until 1992...
) and Your M.P. by Gracchus (Tom Wintringham
Tom Wintringham
Thomas Henry Wintringham was a British soldier, military historian, journalist, poet, Marxist, politician and author. He was an important figure in the formation of the Home Guard during World War II and was one of the founders of the Common Wealth Party.-Early life:Tom Wintringham was born 1898...
).
In addition to books, the LBC also produced a monthly newsletter — with began as a simple club news sheet Left Book News, but gradually developed into a key international political and social affairs paper (as Left News).
Gollancz was a notoriously interventionist editor. He published Orwell's The Road to Wigan Pier
The Road to Wigan Pier
The Road to Wigan Pier is a book by the British writer George Orwell, first published in 1937. The first half of this work documents his sociological investigations of the bleak living conditions amongst the working class in Lancashire and Yorkshire in the industrial north of England before World...
but insisted on prefacing its account of working-class life in the north of England with an introduction disowning its criticisms of middle-class socialists who had little understanding of working class life and later republished the book leaving out the second part of which he disapproved.
In 2006, Ed Miliband
Ed Miliband
Edward Samuel Miliband is a British Labour Party politician, currently the Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition...
MP started the Left Book Club Online as a successor to the original Left Book Club with the aim of stimulating debate around left-wing ideas and texts, but not publishing new work. The website now appears to be defunct.
A small group of booksellers in the UK are working on bringing back a publishing version of the Left Book Club and established a Limited company of the same name in 2002, their site LeftBookClub.com was launched in 2007, where they are documenting progress.