Communism and Poetry: Writing against Capital

It looks as though the very book that we need to identify the twenty-first-century successors to William Morris’s militant narrative poem ‘The Pilgrims of Hope’ is on its way to us.  Edited by Ruth Jennision and Julian Murphet, it appears in Palgrave Macmillan’s ‘Modern and Contemporary Poetry and Poetics’ series and will hit the bookshelves in late August this year.  The publisher’s blurb describes the collection as follows:

‘Communism and Poetry: Writing Against Capital addresses the relationship between an upsurge in collective political practice around the world since 2000, and the crystallization of newly engaged forms of poetry. Considering an array of perspectives―poets, poet-critics, activists and theorists―these essays shed new light on the active interface between emancipatory political thought and poetic production and explore how poetry and the new communism are creating mutually innovative forms of thought and activity, supercharging the utopian imagination. Drawing inspiration from past connections between communism and poetry, and theorizing new directions over the years ahead, the volume models a much-needed critical solidarity with creative strategies in the present conjuncture to activate movements of resistance, on the streets and in verse’.

The only problem with this admirable volume is that you need to be a bit of a capitalist yourself to afford it, since it costs a hefty £89-99 hardback.