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| "Human States" Dia al-Azzawi (1975) |
When I began working on The Old Social Classes in the late 1950s, I was irresistibly drawn to the literature on revolution. I do not know precisely why, but probably my Palestinian background explains it. The disruptions of the lives and world of many Palestinians made them, so to speak, natural rebels. In Iraq the time was one troubles and unusual ideological ferment. The spirit of revolution was in the air. Moreover, what happened in Iraq in 1958 and 1959, and later in 1963—awe-inspiring and terrible events whose course I watched closely and with intense interest—confirmed me in the view that it is in moments of great upheaval that societies are best studied. It seemed, indeed, that at no other moment did Iraq bare itself as much or disclose more of its secrets.
— Hanna Batatu, “The Old Social Classes Revisited,” in Robert A. Fernea and Wm. Roger Louis, eds., The Iraqi Revolution of 1958: The Old Social Classes Revisited (London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 1991). PDF.
Toussaint was not only a black man, he was also a West Indian. A West Indian, Rene Maran, wrote his famous novel Batouala about the ways the French were treating black people in Africa; George Padmore wrote and worked for the world revolution with Africa at its centre; Aime Cesaire had in mind that African civilization would be the one to balance the degradation and the absolute dilapidation of Western civilization; Frantz Fanon worked in Algeria; Fidel Castro called the other day for "the Asian and African combination"; and I wrote my book with the African revolution in mind. It seems that those who come from a small island always think of a revolution in very wide terms. That is the only way they could come out of it. You can't begin to think of a little revolution in a small island. From Toussaint onward, they all had that in mind.
— C.L.R. James, “Lectures on The Black Jacobins,” Small Axe 8 (September 2000). PDF.
