Book Review of Alain Badiou's The Communist Hypothesis by Sean Sheehan from Irish Left Review

Alain Badiou is a heavy weight philosopher of the French May'68 generation and comes from the Maoist tradition. This slim volume of essays designed to resemble Mao's 'little red book' attempts to get a grip with the Idea of Communism in a philosophical sense rather then from its disastrous practice in history. The current of Maoism running throughout (a section on the Chinese Cultural Revolution for instance) is disturbing to a libertarian Marxist like myself; but his believe that Communism cannot transcend its failures by being reduced to a Party/State comes to similar 'non-state' conclusions.

Read Sean Sheehan's review from Irish Left Review here

Book Review of Michael Moorcock's The Dancers At The End Of Time Trilogy by Steven Wu

One of my favourite series of novels by one of my favourite writers. Highly imaginative depiction of a decadent far future Earth and its clash with the mores of Victorian England, where Moorcock uses the influence of the 19th century fin-de- siecle decadents (Beardsley, Wilde etc) to excellent affect. Read Steven Wu's review here, which reflects my re-reading of the book.