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British communist
biography and autobiography
Vida Henning, Woman in a Shabby Brown Coat: Ellen May Cooper 1907-1974, Green Cottage Publishing: Havant, 2000; Len Goldman, Brighton Beach to Bengal Bay: The Adventures of a Young Man in Thirties London and Wartime India, Leonard Goldman: Brighton, 1999; Len Goldman, Back To Brighton: Return to That Lovely Shore, Leonard Goldman: Brighton, 2002; Ralph Russell, Findings, Keepings: Life, Communism and Everything, Shola Books: London, 2001; Helen Tomkins, Mr Lewisham: A Life of Les Stannard, Lewisham Pensioners Forum: London, 2001.
Helen Tomkins, an activist in the Lewisham Pensioners’ Forum, has written Mr Lewisham, a biography of one of the leading members of that forum, Les Stannard, who was earlier an ETU (the electricians’ union) and Communist Party activist. Vida Henning, herself a lifelong communist, records the experience of growing up with communist parents in Woman in a Shabby Brown Coat, a biography of her mother Ellen May Cooper. In Brighton Beach to Bengal Bay and Back to Brighton, two volumes of autobiography by Leonard Goldman, we hear of communism, time in London, India, Leipzig and of course Brighton. The final volume under review here is Findings, Keepings Life, Communism and Everything, the autobiography of Ralph Russell — another communist who from the 1950s taught Urdu at the School of Oriental and African Studies.
Russell, is by his own admission only well know amongst Urdu scholars. Given his perceived unimportance he begins by explicitly posing the question of why he was writing his autobiography. He responds in part with the suggestion that ‘every human being is important.’ Perhaps more substantially he suggests that for those who have ‘thought seriously about how they want to live’ can learn by sharing their experiences with others. To an extent, these suggestions provide a guide to reading all these biographies and autobiographies.
What we learn from these varied lives depends on how we view them. With this in mind each individual may appear to be a representative of a wider population. Les Stannard comes across as a hard-working trade union communist who joined the CPGB at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. Len Goldman’s story is that of a Jewish communist who emigrated to communist East Germany. Ellen Cooper appears in many way the archetypal communist woman — married to a fellow communist, working steadily and largely in the background for the Communist Party at local level, and taking exclusive responsibility for bringing up five children. The Cambridge and public school educated Russell, by way of contrast, may seem a typical member of the 1930s student generation. In describing these generic characteristics, in some of the books, the individual becomes subsumed in a collective narrative. To take only one example amongst many, in some places, the history of the ETU becomes synonymous with the life of Les Stannard.
Yet those features which appear to mark off individuals as ‘typical’ are undercut at every turn by the distinctive character of each person’s life. It is these unique and deeply personal elements that appear much more instructive. Ellen Cooper comes across as a powerful person who joined the Communist Party in spite of — rather than because of — her communist husband. Indeed, she had to stand up to domestic violence, which belies the rather cosy image often given of communist families. Despite her humble background she was engaged as an equal in political activity with Oxford academics. Cooper was also prepared to stand up and have her views counted in public, even at the risk of public scorn. She also attempted to transform her political surroundings, organising, for example, an afternoon sub-group in Oxford which, because of when it met, acted as an effective forum for women’s discussion. Len Goldman carefully presents a picture of his life which is far from one-dimensional. Politics plays its due part, but stress is placed not only on politics, work and family, but also on friends and a social life which sometimes had a non-political theme, but which often, as with his activity in the Unity Theatre, overlapped with political interests. Les Stannard, although clearly in the mould of a trade union communist, born and brought up in inauspicious surroundings, was also committed to his family — idolising his mother and grandmother — and also to his locality. In addition to his political activity in East London, he was a devoted supporter of Milwall Football Club. As Helen Tomkin’s testimony indicates he had the presence and integrity to change the way that others understood the world. Ralph Russell, also presents a rounded portrait of his life. There is nothing, he declares at the outset, which he regards as too ‘private’ to have written about. The text bristles with fascinating details about locations, feelings and especially the music which he remembers accompanying events. Of particular interest, both in itself and because of the impact it had of Russell’s later life, is his account of his time in India from 1942, his relationship with the Indian army, with Indian communists and his increasing mastery of Urdu.
Asking why these biographies are worth reading returns the reader to Russell’s initial questions. His first answer — that every life is important — does not indicate what, if anything, we have to gain from these specific life stories. Russell also suggests the importance of the ‘reflective life’ as a motivation for both the reading and writing of biography. Inevitably, in these narratives there are a number of different ‘reflections’ on the nature of communism. The authors show the difficulties in approaching this subject, but in most cases the discussion seems peculiarly disengaged from the rest of the individual’s life. A little more can be said in defence of reading these books as an insight into the historical events in which the individuals participated. However, it is not the shapers or even the participants in the events of some grander historical narrative which makes these lives particularly interesting. The key to these books’ interest is that they are part of the important process of recreating the lives of rank-and-file political activists without reducing those lives to one-dimensional stereotypes — indeed without always placing activism at the centre of the life.
Gidon Cohen, University of Northumbria
Ordering Details: Mr Lewisham may be purchased by sending a cheque for £4.99 (payable to ‘Lewisham Pensioners’ Forum’) to: The Co-ordinator, LPF, 120 Rushey Green, Catford, London SE6 4HQ. Findings, Keepings is distributed by: Shola Books, 33 Theatre Street, Battersea, London. Woman in a Shabby Brown Coat, is published by: Green Cottage Publishing, 23 Park Lane, Bedhampton, Havant, Hampshire PO9 3HG. Leonard Goldman’s books may be ordered directly from him at: 26 Westfield Crescent, Brighton BN1 8JB.
