[Marxism] George Novack as Marxist writer on philosophy and history

["Graham M." <gkmilner@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Friends,
                   As many subscribers to Marxism List have had some connection 
in the past with the US Socialist Workers Party, I wondered what opinion they 
might hold of George Novack, whom I must say probably had more influence on my 
own thinking and understanding of Marxism than any other SWP leader.

   George Novack wrote in "My Philosophical Itinerary", an autobiographical 
forward to his collection of essays, 'Polemics in Marxist Philosophy', that he 
gravitated toward revolutionary Marxist politics in the early 1930s, under the 
impact of the Great Depression, after a period spent studying literature and 
philosophy at Harvard in the 1920s.   Novack joined the US Trotskyist current, 
and was involved in a number of important struggles in the 1930s, including the 
defence of the framed-up Scottsboro Boys, and the defence of Leon Trotsky from 
the frame-up of the Moscow Trials.   When Trotsky arrived in Mexico in early 
1937, the exiled Russian revolutionary leader urged Novack, who was already 
known as a writer on philosophical subjects, to confront the pragmatist 
philosophical approach prevalent in American intellectual life, and to promote 
Marxist dialectics.

   In the following decades Novack's published output in the spheres of Marxist 
philosophy and general Marxist theory probably exceeded that of any other 
individual writer in the English-speaking world.   Most of these works are 
still in print, and are published by New York's Pathfinder Press.   The 
Australian publisher Resistance Books has recently brought out a selection of 
Novack's writings.

   I had the good fortune to meet George Novack in Sydney, during his speaking 
tour of Australia in 1973.   I was impressed by his lectures, but had not yet 
then, being only a recent recruit to the revolutionary Marxist movement, read 
any of Novack's books.   I believe I must have, since that time, read just 
about everything Novack wrote, except perhaps for a smallish number of 
pamphlets and articles.   Some of his books I've re-read more than once.

   Novack's style I have always found to be eminently accessible, unlike that 
of many of the European Marxist theorists, who seem to find incomprensibility 
or an elliptical mode of expression desirable.   I believe that Novack's 
expositions of rather difficult Marxist philosophical ideas, in books like 'An 
Introduction to the Logic of Marxism' and 'Empiricism and Its Evolution', are 
readily understandable to the layperson.   His more complex works, such as 
'Pragmatism versus Marxism' (on John Dewey's Philosophy) or 'Polemics in 
Marxist Philosophy' (which include essays on Sartre, Lukacs, Kolakowski, 
Engels, Trotsky and other Marxists) are also quite accessible to those without 
academic training in philosophy.   Novack's historical writings are also 
thoughtful and well-considered contributions to Marxist debate.   His writings 
in 'Understanding History: Marxist Essays' contain important insights - 
particularly the essays "Uneven and Combined Development in History" and "The 
Long View of History".   Novack's contributions on US history, collected with 
those of other writers in 'America's Revolutionary Heritage: Marxist Essays', 
are full of original and useful interpretations.

   Novack's history of democracy as a concept and a political form, 'Democracy 
and Revolution', develops an important and creative analysis of democracy from 
the ancient world, down through the epoch of bourgeois-democratic advance, and 
into the 20th century.   'The Origins of Materialism' is a formidable overview 
of ancient thought and culture,. looking at the origins of science and of the 
materialist world outlook.

   One could also mention the essay by Novack included in the volume 'The 
Marxist Theory of Alienation', which also contains material by Ernest Mandel.   
Novack's essay, "The Problem of Alienation", dates from the 1950s, and 
discusses the major issues that were to figure in Marxist debate around the 
question of alienation in the later 1950s, the '60s and the '70s.   Novack also 
published in the mid-1960s an excellent selection of material from the 
philosophical debate between existentialism and Marxism: 'Existentialism versus 
Marxism: Conflicting Views on Humanism'.

   I think that George Novack (who died in the mid-1990s) was one of the finest 
popularisers of Marxist ideas of the 20th century.   I think in this respect he 
deserves to be placed alongside such earlier exemplars of Marxist 
popularisation as Plekhanov, Mehring and Labriola, although Novack himself may 
have eschewed being placed in such exalted company.   The Marxist tradition in 
the USA has produced first-rate theoreticians and contributors in many spheres 
of intellectual life.   In the 20th century, I believe that the revolutionary 
Marxist current in the USA has been particularly prolific in producing 
significant socialist theoreticians, and George Novack stands out to my mind as 
an important, although rather neglected, figure.


                                                                                
In solidarity,


                                                                                
                Graham Milner
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