From: glevy@PRATT.EDU
Date: Sun Nov 27 2005 - 12:55:47 EST
---------------------------- Original Message ------------------------ Subject: 2005 Deutscher Prize From: "Jurriaan Bendien" <adsl675281@tiscali.nl> Date: Sun, November 27, 2005 5:49 am ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Jerry, I think you've answered your own question really. As regards scholars and academics, Louis Proyect is often a "highly unreliable source". He frequently complains that they ought to be more "left", but he cannot satisfactorily explain why they aren't, nor does he offer good reasons for why they should be more "left" than they are. His view of scholars appears to be colored by his own frustrations about not being accepted by the academic fraternity, but he owes that in good part to his own demeanour towards them, which has often been downright rude and offensive (the "Leninist" spirit of demolishing your opponents by cursing at them). You referred recently to "myths" in Marxism, and some of the biggest myths there no doubt concern the Russian revolution and its aftermath. That being the case, Kevin Murphy's meticulous empirical research using four factory-specific archives should be welcomed, insofar as it dispells some myths about the "glory days" of Marxism. Isaac Deutscher himself of course also propagated a myth, the myth of "classical Marxism", and Deutscher inclined to the notion that "rooting out barbarism in the Russian empire with barbarous means" was excusable as an historical inevitability, if it paved the way - as he hoped - for an egalitarian socialism (as we know now, it did not). But at least Deutscher as historian grappled honestly with the contradictions of the Russian revolutions and their aftermath, and insofar as Murphy follows in this spirit, I think the award is quite appropriate (though there might arguably be better candidates). We can hardly make progress and go forward, if we don't know where we've been, or if we persist in defending the indefensible. But as regards all that leftist internal bickering, who cares, it's an irrelevant distraction. Jurriaan Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture A little of the glory of, well time slips away And leaves you with nothing mister but Boring stories of glory days Glory days, yeah goin back Glory days aw he ain't never had Glory days, glory days
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