I bought the penguin edition of this because I was very curious how a mainstream publisher would choose to introduce this. And wow. It’s a doozy. A centre-right, right leaning political analyst who makes his living characterizing Marxism as hopelessly utopian, violent and out of touch seems like the perfect guy to introduce a core text of anarchism, right? I simply could not imagine why that might not work 😅

So far it seems determined to characterize Kropotkin as an out of touch prince with a paternalistic interest in oppressed people. And he keeps comparing anarchism to liberalism in a way that makes me fairly certain he doesn’t understand either. I am not sure that liberalism is characterized by “criticism of the state”.

Which is all to say, if you get a version with the introduction by David Priestland, you can probably skip it and if you don’t I recommend many grains of salt 🙂‍↕️

The purple prose, alliteration and constant similes are A LOT here. I don’t mind some flowery language. But it’s more than a little distracting when it’s this heavy handed.

I don’t think this has been asked before as I searched first but I think I’ve developed a fondness for Agatha Christie. The very first book I read of hers was, of course, And Then There Were None, but I recently read The Murder at the Vicarage and found myself enjoying it even more. I adored the wit and humour in this book, which I found was largely (understandably) absent in the former, which had more of a gothic feel, I felt. Are there any Agatha Christie fans who have suggestions for any other works of hers that combine wit & humour with a good mystery?