Authors Take Sides ...
September 2, 2024 12:30 AM Subscribe
Casy Calver's Authors Take Sides on the Spanish War: A Dossier is an annotated edition of the eponymous 1937 pamphlet [previously], containing "many influential writers' opinions on one of the most significant conflicts of the twentieth century." Calver includes related unpublished documents plus background on contributors like C.L.R. James, Marcus Garvey, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Victor Gollancz, Sylvia Pankhurst, Cecil Day-Lewis, Arthur Koestler, Rebecca West, W.H. Auden, Olaf Stapledon, Elinor Mordaunt, Vera Brittain, and other writers--Eliot, Machen, Wells, etc. In Time last year, Sarah Watling profiled the initiative's leader, Nancy Cunard: "Sometimes Writers Have to Take Sides." See also Writers Take Sides: Letters about the war in Spain from 418 American authors (1938) and books on Vietnam, the Falklands, and Iraq.
Writers don't always take the right side. In fall of 1914 a group of "representatives of German Science and Art" signed a message of support for WWI.
posted by doctornemo at 6:59 AM on September 2 [2 favorites]
posted by doctornemo at 6:59 AM on September 2 [2 favorites]
I was sad to see my old favourite Arthur Machen as one of the few in favour of Franco. I never knew that about him. As I recall, Sylvia Townsend Warner (Communist, actively pro-Republic) was his wife's niece, which must have made for heated conversation when they met up.
posted by misteraitch at 8:32 AM on September 2 [2 favorites]
posted by misteraitch at 8:32 AM on September 2 [2 favorites]
Agreed, misteraitch. Also Evelyn Waugh.
posted by doctornemo at 8:47 AM on September 2 [1 favorite]
posted by doctornemo at 8:47 AM on September 2 [1 favorite]
Back then they had to cancel authors using calculating machines the size of a house!
posted by mittens at 6:40 AM on September 3 [1 favorite]
posted by mittens at 6:40 AM on September 3 [1 favorite]
George Orwell:
"Will you please stop sending me this bloody rubbish. This is the second or third time I have had it. I am not one of your fashionable pansies like Auden or Spender, I was six months in Spain, most of the time fighting, I have a bullet hole in me at present and I am not going to write blah about defending democracy or gallant little anybody."
(He came to know Spender later on and apologized for his uncharacteristic intemperance.)
As to Waugh - bear in mind that he was Catholic and reports of Republican atrocities against clergy and nuns made for grim reading. (Waugh’s caricature of Cunard in Vile Bodies (1930) is pretty savage. No idea how she felt about that. She must have been aware, no?)
posted by BWA at 6:51 AM on September 3 [3 favorites]
"Will you please stop sending me this bloody rubbish. This is the second or third time I have had it. I am not one of your fashionable pansies like Auden or Spender, I was six months in Spain, most of the time fighting, I have a bullet hole in me at present and I am not going to write blah about defending democracy or gallant little anybody."
(He came to know Spender later on and apologized for his uncharacteristic intemperance.)
As to Waugh - bear in mind that he was Catholic and reports of Republican atrocities against clergy and nuns made for grim reading. (Waugh’s caricature of Cunard in Vile Bodies (1930) is pretty savage. No idea how she felt about that. She must have been aware, no?)
posted by BWA at 6:51 AM on September 3 [3 favorites]
Your Pal Aleister: "I witchily stand against Franco."
You: "Yeah!"
Aleister: "And Mussolini is just as bad!"
You: "You tell 'em, Crowley!"
Aleister: "Hitler, on the other hand..."
posted by mittens at 7:26 AM on September 3 [1 favorite]
You: "Yeah!"
Aleister: "And Mussolini is just as bad!"
You: "You tell 'em, Crowley!"
Aleister: "Hitler, on the other hand..."
posted by mittens at 7:26 AM on September 3 [1 favorite]
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posted by HearHere at 3:06 AM on September 2 [4 favorites]