Anarchist Book Fair returns to History Museum

 by Barry Woodling

THE Manchester and Salford  Anarchist Book fair returned to the People's History Museum on Saturday the 7th, Dec.    It passed off without public incident unlike previous Anarchist  Book fairs in London, Liverpool and especially Manchester, which on the last few occasions were marred by serious disturbances.  There was none of this last Saturday, and supporters of the NAN, who were once banned and blacklisted, participated fully in the workshops at this event.

There were the usual wide array of stalls including PM Press, Freedom Press, independent book sellers, as well as Anarchist organisations such as Anarchist Communists, Anarchist Federation and Solidarity Federation.    A number of Campaign groups also had stalls.

The workshops had a distinct Anarchist Studies emphasis.....Matthew Adams presented a paper reviewing a book written by Marie Louise Berneri entitled 'Journey through Utopia'.   The talk contained biographical material and also mentioned the liberal critique of utopianism associated with the works of Berlin, Popper and Arendt.   

The other workshop - I attended was presented by Ruth Kinna of Loughborough University and Anarchist Studies.  Promoting her own recently published book:  'The Government of No One'.

She referred to two key historical moments related to anarchism, namely the Paris Commune of 1871 and the Haymarket trial of anarchists in the following decade.    Her talk encompassed five broad headings:  

1) culture, 2) Education, 3) Activism, 4) Social arrangements  eg utopias and experiments, and 5) Prospects.    She focused on anarchism as a philosophy which opposed all forms of domination including class, power relations, patriarchy and law.

My overall impression was that the book fair was relatively successful in terms of attendance and organisation and this augurs well for the future after a sustained period of conflict which damaged previous book fairs although issues of freedom of speech still have to be resolved.*

Northern Voices has tried hard at the time of publication to contact the organisers of this bookfair for a comment, but we have been unable to get a response or to even find out who were responsible for the event.  However, quite separately someone who knows something about the intricacies of last Saturday's event has defended the organisers challenging the critics by saying:
'You’ve all been involved in organising events before.  And you’re all patently aware of how the organisers ALWAYS get the blame for everything.  The London Bookfair collective got so much abuse after 2017.'

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*  Barry has here reported honestly on the Bookfair as we all understood and appreciated it last Saturday night.  However, on Sunday Northern Voices became aware of an incident of which neither Barry Woodling nor anyone associated with NV or the Northern Anarchist Network (NAN) knew anything about, and we feel we must in fairness produce the link from 'MAKE MORE NOISE' for readers to consider:

https://twitter.com/MakeMoreNoise2/status/1203319566472040448?s=08

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