clair056

'All around me there was an incredible rushing noise, which I knew was composed of shouting and screaming and firecrackers and stamping hoofs, but sounded to me like a great wind, like history' (Hari Kunzru, My Revolutions, 2007) Grosvenor Square, London, 1968 Kunzru's quote is from his novel of late 60s/early 70s radical politics, in which the narrator describes taking part in the anti-Vietnam War demonstration by the US Embassy in London's Grosvenor Square. But that exhilarating noise of history, the sound of the crowd in motion, has been heard in many times and places.

Henry Cow's 'Nine funerals of the Citizen King' is a track on their 1973 debut album 'Legend' and signalled the radical critique which they carried forward until breaking up five years later. The lyrics reference Lewis Carroll ('the Snark was a Boojum' from his poem 'The Hunting of the Snark'), Gertrude Stein ( 'a rose is a rose is a rose' ) and Shakespeare ('O, gentlemen, the time of life is short!...An if we live, we live to tread on kings', Henry IV, Part 1). The latter was also quoted in Guy Debord's 'The Society of the Spectacle' (1967), and as the song refers to the 'spectacle of free' I wonder whether Henry Cow had been reading Debord. If so they were ahead of their time - the first English translation of 'The Society of the Spectacle' was made by Black & Red (Detroit) in 1970, but it was certainly not widely known. The line 'we'll work to live to buy the things we multiply, until they fi...

A chronology of events in the UK See previously:  Welcome to 1984   January 1984 Wed 1 February – print unions and News International agree deal to resume printing of The Times; Sogat 82 calls off blacking of Radio Times on day BBC takes them to court – union members had refused to distribute Radio Times as part of a dispute with Maxwell’s British Printing and Communications Corporation over redundances – as  a result BBC switched printing to Hunter Print in the North East, but the boycott continued (GH 2/2) 2 February: Gilbert & Page factory at Colney Heath, Hertfordshire, which makes snares and pens, set on fire by animal liberationists (I.2) 3 February: official unemployed figures reach almost 3.2 million 3 February: National Coal Board announces closure of Bogside pit in Fife blaming flooding, ten days after announcing closure of  Polmaise colliery near Stirling blaiming geological conditions  - workers rejected both reasons for closure (GH 4 Feb) 3 Feb ...

Some pictures from Athens last weekend: Demonstrators gather outside the university on 6 December, the 6th anniversary of the killing of 15 year-old Alexis Grigoropoulos by police. Thousands took to the streets to remember Alexis and to express solidarity with his friend Nikos Romanos,  on hunger strike in prison ( the hunger strike has now ended ). Later there were clashes, with tear gas and petrol bombs ( from BBC News ) Syrian refugees protesting at their camp in Syntagma Square, opposite the parliament building 'We faced death passing the sea, now we're sleeping at Greek streets' Sunday December 7th - an art students banner on  protest outside Parliament against the setting of a new austerity budget At least 5,000 (my estimate) took part in the Sunday evening protest (image from here of a trade union contingent on demo) Some street art from the Exarchia area: