Bandits by Eric Hobsbawm is probably one of the most significant scholarly works in the field of countercultural studies. Hobsbawm, who died on October 1, 2012, takes a structuralist approach to history and proposes a pattern to the tradition of the bandit, and to the support a bandit might find within its community, much like how Joseph Campbell, in hisHero with A Thousand Faces claims to identify a pattern to hero stories in myth and literature. Hobsbawm is perceiving his pattern in the popular discourse surrounding the figures of banditry, noting not simply the actual bandit, but also the socially constructed bandit figure. My copy, that I am discussing here, is the original 1969 edition that runs a mere 126 pages in length. My understanding is that the most recent edition contains more than 100 new pages of text.
The active bandit, according to Hobsbawm, can gain popular support via banditry when the establishment is perceived as hopelessly corrupt in the eyes of the populace. Then a bandit may even victimize members of the population that they draw support from as long as they also antagonize the dominant system. Hobsbawm also argues that the stories of bandits often involve an absent sovereign, which is the case in the Robin Hood stories, where the king is away and a despotic prince and his gooney sheriff strictly enforce taxation rules. This allows a populace who invests in the bandits glory to still believe in the dominant system, as the current state of society is a temporary aberration. Hobsbawm does not only discuss the structure of the Bandit story as it lives in folklore, he investigates the concrete historical bandits that inspired the trope of bandit folklore. He uses a variety of examples from history including Robin Hood (who, he speculates, may never have actually existed), but also figures such as the Australian Ned Kelly, Sandor Roza of Hungary, Gaetano Meomartino of Italy, and many others. The book includes a lot of images taken from popular sources throughout history, ranging from 17th century circulars featuring woodcuts of Robin Hood, to 19th century photographs and even 20th century film stills.
A Radical History of Britain is, like the title promises, a historical survey of politically radical activity occurring in England. The book begins in the year 878 with a chapter on King Alfred the Great, who in that year was hiding out during an invasion of vikings into his kingdom. Vallance referred to Alfred as “the first British radical” due to his deep ability to sympathize with his people and eventually send a conquering force back to Denmark. A Radical History then follows through the centuries, noting successive waves of radical activity at every historical turn, right up until the 2000s with various anti-globalization and anti-war activities. A Radical History of Britain is a lengthy historical survey that stands as an English equivalent to Howard Zinn’sA People’s History of the United States in its purpose and scope. Edward Vallance is, according to the website biography he wrote of himself, a historian of early modern Britain. He has also written a book about the English revolution of 1688. Unlike Zinn, he makes no particular claim towards focusing his career as a historian on radical history although he has appeared as an expert commentator in British media on aspects of contemporary and historical radicalism.
A Radical History of Britain is a straightforward, comprehensive, historical survey of British radicalism with virtually all of the great peasant uprisings and industrial worker strikes, as well as chapters on the important 17th century radical movements such as the Diggers and Ranters, and the later 19th century Luddites and Chartists, all of whom are still frequently referred to by their modern-day equivalents. The book is exhaustive in its study of these movements. Where the book falters is in its treatment of the post-WWII period, where Vallance mostly focuses on the rise of the Labour party as a mainstream political force. England has been home to some of the fiercest anti-corporate, environmental, and animal rights protest movements in the world, and there’s no mention of, for example, the McLibel trial or anti-genetic modification protests that have even involved Prince Charles. Other missing features of England’s recent radical history include Reclaim the Streets and the revitalization of anarchism in the late 70s by certain punk bands (especially with groups like Crass, one of the most intensely serious political bands in music history). Anyone who is interested in these subjects will have to look elsewhere (like Naomi Klein’s No Logo), for the older forms of radical activity.......however, this is a good book.
