Re: [Marxism] Fwd: Books on the Spanish Civil War

[Andy Coates <esquincle@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I asked John Cox, onetime Marxmail subscriber, for his suggestions.
He has written an excellent historiography on the Spanish Civil War.
I'd add that I read the Beevor book last year and would recommend it
also.
Andy Coates

From John Cox:
Thanks for the forward, Andy; here are a few books:

The best general histories, in my opinion, are "The Revolution and
Civil War in Spain" (Broue and Temime, 1972--the authors were
influenced by Trotskyism) and "The Spanish Civil War" by Antony Beevor
(1982), a more mainstream historian who has written popular books on
Stalingrad and the fall of Berlin; it was just re-released in
paperback. The book by the two French guys is very hard to find, but is
in most decent university libraries. I've heard that Helen Graham, "The
Spanish Republic at War" (2002) is good, but I haven't read it.

Other good general histories: "The Spanish Civil War: Revolution &
Counter-Revolution" (Burnett Bolloten, 1991); Hugh Thomas, "The Spanish
Civil War" (1994), Stanley Payne, "The Spanish Revolution" (1970), and
Gabriel Jackson, "The Spanish Republic and the Civil War 1931-1939"
(1965). I would recommend each of these with reservations, but they
each have their virtues and they are important in the historiography.
Noam Chomsky's excellent essay, "Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship"
(in "American Power and the New Mandarins," 1967, recently
re-published) exposes some of the problems in Jackson's approach in
particular, and Chomsky's essay is a great introduction to some of the
key issues in the revolution and civil war.

Paul Preston has written and edited some good books, and Ronald
Fraser's "Blood of Spain" is a wonderful oral history. "Homage to
Catalonia" is obviously still must-reading for an account of life in
the revolutionary months of 1936-37, and for insight into the Stalinist
betrayal (that's one reason why Alexander Cockburn, whose father played
a disgraceful role, still gets so worked up about Orwell!). And watch
Ken Loach's brilliant "Land and Freedom" after reading Orwell.


_______________________________________________
Marxism mailing list
Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism