FRUITS OF THE MARAZION QUAKER LIBRARY (14) - MARCUS REDIKER (2017) 'THE FEARLESS BENJAMIN LAY - THE QUAKER DWARF WHO BECAME THE FIRST REVOLUTIONARY ABOLITIONIST'

Marcus Rediker, the biographer of Benjamin Lay, is Distinguished Professor of Atlantic History at the University of Pittsburgh and Senior Research Fellow at the College d'etudes mondiales in Paris. He is from a working-class background and the first in his family to attend university but dropped out in 1971 unable to cope with the elitism he encountered. Already the protests against the Vietnam war were shaping his radical activism which was further honed by three years working in a cellophane factory. When he was laid off, he enrolled on a university course and graduated in 1976. After his doctorate, Marcus Rediker emerged as an outstanding advocate of a 'history from below approach' shaped by a Marxist awareness of the nature of capitalist society. His main focus has been on slavery and the slave-trading ships, showing the influence of the sea in the history of countries bordering on the Atlantic. He is the author of The Slave Ship as well as The Fearless Benjamin Lay. 

The response to his biography of Benjamin Lay has been very positive:

The Publishers Weekly review states that the book "successfully rescues Lay from obscurity" and that Benjamin Lay "deserve[s] to be remembered."^[12] The Guardian included the book on their list of the best biographies and autobiographies of 2017 saying that the book is "micro-history at its best".^[13] Christianity Today commented on the book saying that it "brings vividly to life a near-forgotten figure".^[14]   Benjamin Lay's life story unfolded in England, the Caribbean and the American colonies in a remarkable fashion in the course of which he emerged as a critically important figure in the turn against slave ownership. Lay was a radical, free spirit abolitionist. 

I am impressed with Marcus Rediker. He is a fine historian. As for Benjamin Lay, I find him truly inspirational, as does Marcus Rediker. Lay deserves a prominent place in the larger drama of American history and we Quakers need to know about his remarkable life and learn lessons from his fortitude and spirit. Benjamin Lay embodied a set of principles that fit well with American and Western ideals of democracy and equality too often breached in the real world. Benjamin Lay cared for the world and all its creatures. He wrote on the margin of one of the two hundred books he kept in his cave: "Dear souls, be tender hearted." 

Benjamin Lay - this portrait by William Williams in 1758 depicts Lay in front of his cave in Abington but makes no reference to his deep commitment to the cause of abolitionism. Benjamin Lay would not have given his approval for such a portrait; he would have seen it as an expression of vanity. 

Benjamin Lay's family had lived in the small village of Copford in Essex, around sixty miles from London, for several generations. His grandparents, William and Prudence, joined the Quaker movement sometime after 1655, towards the end of the period that encompassed the civil war from 1642 to 1649, the execution of the king, Charles I, in 1649, and the Cromwellian Protectorate that came to an end in

THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM - THESE ARE THE POLICIES NOBODY IN THE LABOUR GOVERNMENT IS TALKING ABOUT

TAX JUSTICE has published a paper on how to manage our economy and be true to the values of social justice. Here it is below; it's well worth a read. I shall print it off and inwardly digest and spread the word. Just a couple of pictures this time:

Osborne was the chancellor between 2010 and 2015; he and Cameron followed policies that meant the poor, weak and vulnerable bore the brunt of their plans to reduce the size of the state. Now Reeves and Starmer are also targeting the most needy in our society - and yet there are billions of pounds of surplus wealth waiting to be redistributed in the interests of a fair and decent society. Why are they not following

FRUITS OF THE MARAZION QUAKER LIBRARY (13) - AKALA (2018) NATIVES: RACE & CLASS IN THE RUINS OF EMPIRE

I am very grateful to Jo Wren, a Quaker in our Marazion Meeting House community, for recommending Akala's book for inclusion in the library some weeks ago. I am also humbled that I had never heard of Akala - an award-winning hip-hop artist, writer, educator and social entrepreneur - before. Shame on me. I try to keep up with what is important in the political and social spheres - but Akala's name and work remained unknown. 

Akala in 2014

Here is a section of the Wikipedia entry for Akala:

"Kingslee James McLean Daley (born 1 December 1983),^[1] known professionally as Akala, is a British rapper, writer and activist from Kentish Town, London. In 2006, he was voted the Best Hip Hop Act at the MOBO Awards^[2] and has been included on the annual Powerlist of the 100 most influential Black British people in the UK, most recently making the 2021 edition.^[3][4]"

Make no mistake - Natives is a vital book for understanding our society and our history. David Olusoga (see my blogpost link here: Rob Donovan - Author: FRUITS OF THE MARAZION QUAKER LIBRARY (8) - DAVID OLUSOGA (2020) 'BLACK AND BRITISH - A SHORT, ESSENTIAL HISTORY') wrote in the Guardian: 'Part biography, part polemic, this powerful, wide-ranging study picks apart the British myth of meritocracy'. The Independent noted that Akala's 'Natives' was 'A potent combination of autobiography and political history which holds up a mirror to contemporary Britain.  

Akala explains that the purpose of his book is to examine how the seemingly impersonal forces of race and class have impacted and continue to shape our lives, and 'how easily I could now be telling you a very different but much more common story of cyclical violence, prison and part-time, insecure and low-paying work'. 

In Chapter 1, Akala provides a devastating analysis of Britain in the 1980s, the decade of his birth. We were and are a racist society and he lays the historical reasons bare. Such racism cannot be understood without grasping the power of class. In short, 'whiteness', to quote James Baldwin, 'is a metaphor for power'. Those who have exercised power in the world have been and still largely are white. Blackness is bad; whiteness is good. This was why, in spite of all the sufferings of poor people in Britain, there was a 'Keep Britain White' campaign that sections of the working class supported. Akala's maternal granddad