David Gilchrist

I was somewhat taken aback by Sasha Simic’s article in the last edition of Socialist Review. Three of the world’s best known and critically acclaimed filmmakers — Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola and the socialist Ken Loach — have criticised the methods and output of the corporate giant Disney and its franchise outlet Marvel. Sasha criticises the filmmakers but not the corporation.

Amazingly Sasha dismisses the opinions of the three on the basis that he thinks they are being elitist.

A prolific playwright, Ödön von Horváth wrote his first novel Youth Without God in 1938, a year before his death. He remained in Germany for a few years after the Nazis gained power, but was a fierce anti-Nazi. Von Horváth had been involved in street fights with the fascists and at various times was in critical dialogue with the German Communist Party (KPD).

The actor Peter Fonda, who died last month aged 79, was Hollywood royalty. His father was Henry Fonda, star of classic films such as Twelve Angry Men and The Grapes of Wrath. Fonda senior’s sensitive performances established the idea of the American as a thoughtful liberal, intent on rooting out prejudice and injustice and bringing about a better way of life for all.

Ian Taylor seems to have reviewed a book that he wished someone had written about Germany (Reviews, May SR). Unfortunately I think he dismisses too lightly the book Oliver Nachtwey actually wrote.

To expect a book about the German economy in the present day to contain a critique of the German Revolution and the Nazi period is rather a stretch.

Enzo Traverso notes in the opening of this book that, in 2018, eight countries of the EU have governments led by far right, nationalist and xenophobic parties. Add to this National Rally in France, the AfD in Germany, the presidency of Trump in the US and the election of Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil and the scope of problems posed by this development are far reaching. The question of the revival of fascism and the right is a real one.

Having spent 20 years teaching, I thought that going to see a play about education might be a bit of a busman’s holiday. I was also worried that it might be rather like one of those programmes on television about schools that are so unrealistic as to distract anyone with any knowledge of what happens there. I need not have worried. This excellent and well observed play by Richard Molloy is realistic to the point of painfulness. The frustration, the hope, the joy of what it is like to work or study in the contemporary education system is beautifully shown.

Geographer Danny Dorling quotes that in an 1879 testimony to a select committee of the British parliament one petitioner said, “Geography, sir, is ruinous in its effects on the lower classes. Reading, writing, and arithmetic are comparatively safe, but geography invariably leads to revolution.”

Katharyne Mitchell is able to use the geographer’s skill at looking at the changes in the system, both over time and spatially, and is able to draw the links between ideology, causes, and effects.

I enjoyed Noel Halifax’s review of the exhibition Another Kind of Life (April SR). It is a complex exhibition and as he says raises questions about the nature of photography and how it is exhibited.

I think that on the whole the rise of the curator is to be welcomed: it makes explicit the previously hidden biases of exhibitions. It makes clear that any artwork is a transaction between creator and viewer.

Liz Fekete has done all socialists and anti-racists a service by documenting the extent of right wing mobilisation across Europe. She discusses the rise of the fascist right such as the Front National in France, and the right wing parties that are gaining ground in Austria, Poland, Hungary and the rest of eastern Europe.

Importantly she identifies this push as coming not simply from fascist ideologues but from the actions of mainstream parties as they adopt increasingly right wing positions.

Berlin is a city where the dead continue to walk. History remains alive in its streets. Yet Berlin is also a vibrant modern city. This novel displays both sides, its prose sparse and modern, but underneath the surface lie layers and layers of hidden memory.

The story is of Richard, a retired classical academic who, in search of something to occupy his time, begins researching the lives of the refugees displaced by the wars in Africa and who are occupying a square in the city.