simonator's Reviews (183)

This was my first Hemingway and took my breath away.  There is such richness in this tale of humanity stripped to its bone, heart-pounding action, and deep emotion. It's all the better because this could have been such a bad novel. 
One could have easily mocked the pathos, the damsel-in-distress Maria character, and the romanticisation of rugged men in war. But that's not what this is. Instead, this novel paints a cast of painfully real and believable characters who are both complex and simple in their beliefs, desires, weaknesses and heroism. Maria, helpless and infinitely devout to the protagonist as she is, is at her core a fundamentally broken girl who has seen the worst of fascist monstrosity, her disposition being a natural reflection of her lived experience. An experience which by no means is absurd or invented; it is historical reality. Her lack of agency is more than compensated by Pilar, the headstrong and stubborn authority of the Guerilla band, and one of the most well-rounded female characters written by a man ever. The other Guerilleras bring the scenes of bonfire chats, tactical discussions, heated arguments to vivid detail; each of them a true-to-life painting of the complexities and contradictions of real human life. 

This is a story of anti-fascist struggle. It takes no  wishy-washy both-sides approach to the Spanish Civil War, but firmly and thankfully locates the moral authority with the Spanish Communists (including some funny digs at the Anarchists). Although I was amused by Hemingway's apparent compulsion to make the protagonist a WASP from Montana who was less than enthusiastic about planned economies. There is only so much American audiences were willing to indulge, it seems. The tale is cast into glum twilight from the beginning because readers will know that the Republic would eventually fall to Franco's barbarians. The military offensive that the plot centres around is therefore from the start the heartbreaking symbol of Spain's inevitable doom. Many people take issue with the book's ending. But I believe it represents the futility of the Communist tragedy as well as it possibly could have. 

I read this many years ago before starting uni and I remember how utterly inspired I felt by this memoir. But even my young self noticed the author's incredibly massive ego and egocentrism, no matter how disguised by layers upon layers of irony, self-digs, and, admittedly funny, self-deprecating humour. In the end, the guy's kind of a charming asshole, who has unfortunately a lot of interesting stories to tell and writes them well.
All in all, an incredibly exciting read wherein Westerners can learn a lot about life and the world, but the West-centricity of it all should be kept in mind at all times. To his credit, the author himself is keenly aware. 

Obviously, I opened this with the highest possible expectations. But while it may sound sacrilegious to some comrades, I did not enjoy 200 pages of a rabid Lenin foaming at the mouth at Kautsky, Proudhorn, and other perceived heretics. Halfway between polemic pamphlet and theory, I found the most interesting bits in Lenin's direct and extensive quotes of Engels and Marx. Nevertheless, one must admit that while Lenin's prose is never pleasant aesthetically, it sure is sound, comprehensive and born of a powerful mind. 

As one of the most important bits of theoretical clarification, Lenin quotes Engels in conceptualising the state as emanating from society and the mode of production, but then alienating itself to become removed and a tool of oppression. But coincidentally, what was the Soviet Union if not a state machinery born from the people's revolution but alienating itself only to transform into a repressive bureaucracy entirely removed from workers? How can one possibly reconcile Lenin's vanguardism with the notions delineated in 'State and Revolution'?
Chomsky, for all his faults, has a great discussion of State and Revolution on Youtube, where he discusses how this work is written by a Lenin that opportunistically (ironically) wrote this piece much closer to the German Marxist mainstream à la Luxemburg and Liebknecht to gather street credit among Marxists than what he wrote before or after, and had nothing to do with the policies he favoured and come to execute. Having read this, I must agree: This work tells us much more about Lenin than Marx & Engels.

Do not let its literary reputation and popularity among young contemporary anarchists fool you into thinking this is anything but a raging rant that nowadays might have been published by a college student on their blog who has just read Ayn Rand and Nietzsche for the first time. 

I jest, because this writing is exceedingly eloquent and occasionally humorous in its passion. But it's far-fetched from a systematic or even coherent guide to an anti-state life. One can appreciate it as a piece of polemic poetry, but the intellectual ideas are put so far to the forefront, that one cannot avoid engaging with them critically. And after such engagement, I cannot help but identify a pervasive degree of naivety, shortsightedness, and immaturity. As such, it is much more of a useful relic for the libertarian tradition than it is for the anarchist. At the very least, it is a diverting piece of history to consume. 

Blattman's a brilliant scientist and statistician. Like his academic work, this accessible book takes a non-dogmatic, evidence-led approach that is undogmatic and grounded in empiricism. His school of thought is hard to pin down, but there is a certain unreflected acceptance of rationality as an epistemology underpinning his approach. Nevertheless, he does not blindly accept the homo-economicus-dogmas of mainstream economic thought; refreshing! Nevertheless, while his academic credentials are top-grade, this book reads at times a tad superficial - especially when he uses (cherry-picks?) historical anecdotes to explain interstate war. I wonder whether his analysis is perhaps exclusively applicable to civil wars and internal conflicts rather than explaining what makes states go to war.

Charmant wie immer. 

Enjoyable read with evocative writing. The humanity and individuality given to each character makes this novel feel very real(istic). The plot and messaging were somewhat foreseeable and compared to Things Fall Apart, it all felt a little less meaningful.

The underlying research of this book is actually impressive and there are some nuggets of interesting thought in here. However, the book could have immensely profited off some actual data presented in some scientific fashion, or illustrations. Not even a list of the countries of the lowest billion is included anywhere. Only stylised facts and cherry-picked anecdotes scatter the text. This level of incidental evidence is too flimsy for the sweeping arguments presented. Thus, the book remains too superficial, while simultaneously incredibly dismissive of alternative schools of thought. Also, recommendations are just incredibly out-there without the necessary data to back them up ("as many military interventions in poor countries as possible!") and sometimes, the language is patronising (poor countries keep getting compared to stupid children). 

Fails to grip and convince of central concepts. Lacks analytical clarity. Some points for interesting and underexplored subject matter.