Peter Harrington london

A selection of significant works from the 19th and 20th centuries Anarchist Literature

Issued by Emma Goldman’s publishing house

BAKUNIN, Mikhail. God and the State. With a preface by Carlo Cafiero and Elisée Reclus. New York: Mother Earth Publishing Association, [1916]

Octavo. Original printed paper wrappers, wire-stitched. 10 pp. publisher’s advertisements at the rear. Photographic portrait frontispiece. Wrappers browned, discoloured from staples, and with some wear, loss and tears to the spine and rear wrapper, frontispiece loose, else the contents evenly toned and clean, a very good copy of a fragile publication.

First edition thus of Bakunin’s most famous work, the “Mother Earth” edition published by Emma Goldman’s press.

God and the State first appeared in French in 1882, with a preface by two of Bakunin’s most devoted disciples, Carlo Cafiero and Elisée Reclus. In September 1883 the New England anarchist Benjamin Tucker—credited with popularising Bakunin’s ideas across North America—published an English translation, which sold very well, quickly going through at least ten printings. Tucker’s translation was reissued in 1896 (by E. H. Fulton in Iowa), 1900 (by Abe Isaak in San Francisco), and in the present edition by Goldman’s Mother Earth Publishing Association in 1916.

[130068] £70

DE CLEYRE, Voltairine. Anarchism and American Traditions. Chicago: Free Society Group, 1932

Octavo, pp. 20. Original printed paper wrappers, wire-stitched as issued, photographic portrait of de Cleyre to front cover. Splits to head and foot of front panel joint, tiny closed tear to head of rear panel, covers just very faintly soiled; a well- preserved and bright copy of this notably ephemeral piece.

First edition thus, a posthumous printing of Voltairine de Cleyre’s most often cited essay, with an additional hagiographic introduction. De Cleyre’s influential essay was first published in fellow activist Emma Goldman’s anarchist journal Mother Earth in 1909; de Cleyre was a regular contributor to the journal from its foundation in 1905. This reissue was published on behalf of the International Anarchist Publishing Committee of America by the Free Society Group, an organisation founded in 1923 focused on publishing anarchist propaganda.

[135133] £175 GOLDMAN, Emma. Die Ursachen des Niederganges der russischen Revolution. Mit einem Vorwort von Rudolf Rocker. Berlin: Der Syndikalist, 1922

Duodecimo. Original orange printed wrappers. Pencilled ownership signature to title page and a few marginal markers, ink inscription at end of text. A little creased, tear to foot of spine, contents evenly toned, small perforation to upper margin of last leaf. A good copy of a fragile publication.

First edition thus of a compilation of four key articles on Russia, children’s welfare, and the lives of two of Goldman’s fellow revolutionaries, published immediately after her exile in Russia by the Berlin-based Der Syndikalist; a nice copy in the original wrappers.

The four articles are “The Crushing of the Russian Revolution”, Goldman’s first and most comprehensive analysis of her experiences in Russia from 1919 to 1921; “The Situation of Children in Russia”; “Reminiscences of Kropotkin”, written in memory of her fellow anarchist, who had died the previous year and for whose funeral she had written the eulogy; and “The Fate of Spiridonova”, an account of the famous Russian revolutionary Maria Spiridonova, with whom Goldman had spent some time in hiding. The foreword is by Goldman’s close friend Rudolf Rocker.

[141115] £500

KROPOTKIN, Peter. Autograph letter signed, “P. Kropotkin”. Boxborough Road, Harrow-on-the-Hill: 2 October, 1888

Single bifolium (leaf size 179 × 115 mm), hand written across one page in ink. Creased from folding as usual, final page sometime pasted to card mount and later removed, leaving some glue and paper residue. Overall in very good condition.

Autograph letter signed by the Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin (settled in England after fleeing persecution in Russia and the continent) to an unknown recipient, finalising the arrangements for a provisional lecture of his to be given on 17 October 1888.

In the letter Kropotkin refers to one “Mr Appleton” as the organiser of this particular lecture, perhaps the American anarchist Henry Appleton.

[129779] £1,350 First edition of Marx’s announcements for Das Kapital, part of a complete run of Der Vorbote, from the library of anarchist Johann Most

MARX, Karl. Advance announcements of the publication of Das Kapital. Geneva: Verlag der Association, 1867

Octavo (204 × 122 mm), a complete run (72 monthly issues from 1866 to 1871). Recent purple half morocco and marbled paper boards, new endpapers, retaining the original front free endpaper. Spine lettered and dated in gilt (with the title misspelled as “Der Verbote”). Contemporary ownership inscription of “J. Most” – Johann Most (1846–1906) – in blue pencil, a second inscription to title page of April 1869 issue, and occasional annotation to the text. Contents generally clean with occasional spotting and dampmarks, some stab holes visible at gutters, a few issues trimmed in the binding process, those printed on inferior paper stock fragile at the margins and with a few short tears and more toning than others, 1 full leaf (April 1868) and 1 half leaf (January 1870) cut away and 4 other instances of excised portions clipped from the text by a previous owner; a rare survival.

First edition of Marx’s formal announcements, both signed and unsigned, of the publication of the first volume of his magnum opus, Das Kapital, in the uncommon revolutionary socialist journal Der Vorbote. It has an exceptional provenance, being from the library of the German radical journalist and agitator Johann Most, who played a part in Das Kapital’s publication history and with whom Marx had a turbulent relationship.

[120907] £15,000

NOZICK, Robert. Anarchy, State, and Utopia. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1974

Octavo. Original brown cloth, spine lettered in green, top edge red. With the dust jacket. Various newspaper clippings on the book inserted at rear with offset toning to endpapers, contemporary pencilled ownership signature to front free endpaper. Very light bumping at spine ends, else a near-fine copy in like jacket, very light creasing at extremities and very faint soiling, yet still a fresh example, the spine panel unusually bright.

First UK edition, first impression, using the American sheets as published the same year by Basic Books in New York. Nozick’s influential work on free-market libertarianism is “recognised as a classic of modern political philosophy... it is widely credited with breathing new life into the discipline in the second half of the twentieth century” (Bader & Meadowcroft).

[139972] £250 An early edition in English of Plechanoff’s analysis of anarchist strategy

PLECHANOFF, George. Anarchism and Socialism. Translated by Eleanor Marx Aveling. London: The Twentieth Century Press, Limited, 1906

Octavo. Original red cloth, front board lettered in gilt. Spine ends and corners bumped with some light wear, boards marked, hinges cracked but firm, a few marginal marks to text, otherwise a very good copy.

An early edition in English of the Marxist theoretician’s important analysis of anarchist strategy. It was first translated into English by Aveling – the socialist writer and activist, and daughter of Karl Marx – in 1895. Excerpts appeared in the Weekly Times and Echo before it appeared in book form that same year, published simultaneously by the New Times Socialist Publishing Company (Minneapolis) and Twentieth Century Press.

George Plechanoff, or Georgi Valentinovich Plekhanov (1856–1918) as he is more commonly known, is often referred to as the “father of Russian Marxism” and is credited with establishing the social-democratic movement in Russia.

[119651] £100

PROUDHON, Pierre-Joseph. Qu’est-ce que la propriété? Ou recherches sur le principe du droit et du gouvernement. Premier mémoire. Paris: Librairie de Prévot, 1841

Duodecimo (182 × 112 mm). Original buff wrappers printed in black, edges uncut. Later ownership stamp of “Alf. Mathey” to front wrappers. Wrappers professionally restored, contents bright with occasional light foxing, still a very good copy.

Second edition of the French anarchist philosopher’s notorious thesis which caused a scandal by equating all property with theft. In the wake of the social turmoil caused by the economic decline in France in 1839–40 and the July Monarchy’s lapse into a “religion of property”, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) argued that – unlike freedom and equality – the right to property was not a natural right. Yet he also opposed collective ownership, as he was persuaded that only a society without government is able to establish social harmony. Proudhon himself referred to Qu’est-ce que la propriété? as a “diabolical work which frightens even me” and he was called to defend himself against insurrection charges at his local court immediately after its publication.

[121060] £2,750 9 [ROSSETTI, Olivia & Helen.] MEREDITH, Isabel, pseud. A Girl Among the Anarchists. London: Duckworth & Co., 1903

Octavo. Original buff cloth, spine lettered in black, front board panelled in black. Spine slightly slanted and dulled, ends bruised and extremities rubbed, front board a little marked, hinges cracked but firm, front free endpaper renewed, half-title and rear endpapers browned, removal of label visible on rear pastedown, else a very good copy.

First edition, first impression, of the Rossetti sisters’ pseudonymously published semi-autobiographical memoir of their experiences as teenagers in the late 19th-century anarchist underground movement in London. The titular narrator Isabel Meredith shuns her comfortable Victorian home for the life of a revolutionary only to eventually reject anarchism on humanistic grounds, a move which reflects the sisters’ own disillusionment with this particular strain of radical politics.

[130071] £675

SHAW, Nellie. Whiteway. A Colony on the Cotswolds. London: the C. W. Daniel Company, 1935

Octavo. Original green cloth, spine lettered in red. With the dust jacket. Facsimile frontispiece of a letter from H. G. Wells, 5 photographic plates. 4 laid-in newspaper clippings regarding a radio play about Whiteway, with accompanying annotated leaves. Small hole to front joint not reaching book block, spotting to edges. An excellent, bright copy in the dust jacket with a few markings to the front panel and two portions of tape repair to verso.

First edition, first impression. Whiteway was a Tolstoyan anarchist community established by Quaker journalist Samuel Veale Bracher near the Gloucestershire village of Miserden in 1898. “Vegetarianism was obligatory, nudism optional … [An early visitor remarked that] prosperity … sapped some of the primitive rigour from the venture. However, the sexual permissiveness that had been one of the founding tenets remained … In the 1920s the Colony was infiltrated by the Home Office, anxious about revolutionary tendencies” (Aslet, Villages of Britain, online). Shaw was one of the first members of the community, which survives to the present day.

[113477] £850

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