The Match that did not bring the Explosion (1934)

From the November 1934 issue of the Socialist Standard

An incident which happened on October 8th in Marseilles brings to mind, somewhat vividly, the assassination at Sarajevo, in July, 1914, of the Archduke Ferdinand, Crown Prince of Austria. On October 8th King Alexander of Jugoslavia was assassinated whilst on an official visit (a peace mission, so it is said) to Paris.

The news of the assassination came with dramatic suddenness, and the Press, which was caught unawares, commented on the news with restraint. Later, however, the Press generally went to some trouble to assure its readers that "History was not repeating itself." Candidus, in the Daily Sketch on October 10th said : "The mind of everyone will instinctively go back to the murder of the Archduke at Sarajevo, which led to the Great War. But I do not apprehend any political results from this murder, except that it certainly will not encourage a more liberal policy in Croatia.” He goes on to say : "The trouble of Sarajevo arose out of the fact that one nation was anxious to make an excuse for war. No nation has any such interest in this murder."

What is surprising in the above statement is that at the moment an "excuse” for war is not wanted and the implicit suggestion that if an "excuse" were necessary the convenient assassin and assassinated would appear.

There arc still some workers who believe that the last war was caused by the murder of Ferdinand, Crown Prince of Austria, at Sarajevo, and who would perhaps have believed the same regarding the assassination of Alexander had another excuse for war been needed. Indeed, our masters would foster the illusion that nations become engaged in war with each other, involving death and injury to millions of workers, because of such an incident.

At present the whole Press reminds us with frequency that there is a state of tension existing between certain countries in Europe, and that at any moment some incident such as the assassination of King Alexander would result in another European war. In fact, some newspapers, such as the Daily Mail and the Daily Express, are almost every day urging the Government to drastically increase armaments (to preserve peace, of course!).

The answer of the Socialist to war or the threat of war, is clear and unambiguous: summed up in a phrase in our manifesto to the workers, issued in September, 1914, it is: " hat there is no interest at stake justifying the shedding of one drop of working-class blood."

A. G. A.

"I Took off My Tie" (1936)

Book Review from the December 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard

"I Took off My Tie" by Hugh Massingham (W. Heinemann, LTD.). 10s. 6d.

Mr. Massingham is an author of some reputation. Impelled by "curiosity and struck by the extraordinary fact that two communities were living side by side, each with its own peculiar customs, superstitions, culture . . . . and that each was ignorant of the other," he visited, and decided to live, in the East End of London, to see for himself how workers fare.

In dealing with a subject that has been dealt with before he succeeds in maintaining a sense of proportion. He does not dramatise, neither is he sentimental. He writes in simple language, and stimulates the imagination. Anyone living in the East End will recognise an accurate picture of life and work there. But what a drab picture. Dirt, noise, ignorance and sordid poverty . . .

Mr. Massingham seems to have met prejudice, suspicion and animosity wherever he went, even though he "took off his tie" and tried to be "one of us like." The people he met seem to possess a vocabulary which extended very little beyond a few fruity idioms, which, on paper, might excite literary-minded persons, but gives the impression that the worker is just a mental bumpkin. The trouble with Mr. Massingham's book is that it is superficial, and does not get below the surface. It leaves the impression that the horrible drabness of slum life is unalterable, something the worker is ordained to live. To be precise, it is literary, a picture in words; a picture which paints only what is seen, and nothing potential.

Mr. Massingham might be recommended to extend his investigations further into "the extraordinary fact" that "two communities: live side by side. He might enquire why there are two classes in society, why one of them is poverty-stricken, ill-educated, dispossessed, and has to sell its labour-power in order to live whilst the other possesses the means of living, does not need to work, and has leisure and the refinements of life. To do this he would not have to "take off his tie," nor live in the East End. He need only remove the literary wool from over his eyes and apply himself to a study of capitalism. He might then produce a more useful book, useful from a worker's or a Socialist's point of view.

A. G. A.