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| Das Capital
by Karl Marx "distort the worker into a fragment of a man, they degrade him to the level of an appendage of a machine, they destroy the actual content of his labour by turning it into a torment" The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx "the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles" Common Sense by Tom Paine "there is another and greater distinction for which no truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is the distinction of men into kings and subjects" Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler "the broad mass of a nation ... will more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a small one" Religion and the Rise of Capitalism by RH Tawney “A reasonable estimate of economic organisation must allow for the fact that , unless industry is to be paralysed by recurrent revolts on the part of outraged human nature, it must satisfy criterea which are not purely economic” In Place of Fear by Nye Bevan "in one sense the House of Commons is the most unrepresentative of representative assemblies. It is an elaborate conspiracy to prevent the real clash of opinion which exists outside from finding an appropriate echo within it's walls. It is a social shock absorber placed between privilege and the pressures of popular discontent". The Making of the English Working Class by E P Thompson "When we encounter some sonorous phrase such as 'the strong ebb and flow of the trade cycle' we must be put on our guard. For behind this trade cycle there is a structure of social relations, fostering some sorts of expropriation (rent, interest, and profit) and outlawing others (theft, feudal dues), legitimising some types of conflict (competition, armed warfare) and inhibiting others (trades unionism, bread riots, popular political organisation)..." The Origin of the Species by Darwin "I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection" Parliamentary Socialism by Ralph Miliband "Of political parties claiming socialism to be their aim, the Labour Party has always been one of the most dogmatic - not about socialism, but about the parliamentary system. Empirical and flexible about all else, its leaders have always made devotion to that system their fixed point of reference and the conditioning factor of their political behaviour." The World Turned upside Down by Christopher Hill "within the English Revolution of the mid-seventeenth century which resulted in the triumpth of the protestant ethic - the idealogy of the propertied classes - there threatened another, quite different, revolution. It's success might have established communal property, a far wider democracy in political and legal institutions, might have disestablished the state church and rejected the protestant ethic" |
| A reader of this website recently asked Tony Benn what his top ten non-ficition books were and the list is shown here. Along with the titles listed, Mr Benn placed the bible at the top of his list making it eleven. Obviously not all in the list is a surprise, Benn commented in his diary on 26th December 1976; "Caroline gave us each a copy of the Communist Manifesto in our stockings... I read the Communist Manifesto yesterday, never having read it before, and I found that, without having read any communist text, I had come to Marx's view. It is some confession to make in a diary but the analysis of feudal society, the role of the Church and religion, the class struggle, the impact of technology in destroying the professions, the cash society, the identification of monopoly and the internationalisation of trade and commerce, all these things had been set out clearly by 1848 by Marx and Engels. It is a most astonishing thing and I feel so ignorant that at the age of 51 as a socialist politician in Britain I should never have read that basic text before and I am shy to admit it". Benn's choice of Capital by Marx is slightly different, anyone who has tried to read Capital will testify to just how difficult a body of work it is to get through and fully understand. The role of the dissenting tradition is central to Benn's political philosophy so the inclusion of Christopher Hill's book is also a given. Again, his diary entry for June 1973 reveals how he first came to look at this subject in detail; "I have been really absorbed by reading about the English Revolution and I asked Jack Mendelson , the Labour MP for Penistone, a former university lecturer, if he would give me a private tutorial. We had about an hour in the Tea Room on the Levellers and the Diggers, or True Levellers, who compromised a radical group in Cromwell's army. It was fascinating. He gave me a reading list including Christopher Hill on Cromwell, so I have set aside Antonia Fraser's book now and am concentrating on the serious ideological and historical stuff.". |
| In accordance with the dissenting tradition, Tom Paine's 'Common Sense' is included and in line with the Labour Party and it's relation to socialism we have Raplh Milliband's seminal work 'Parliamentary Socialism' and Aneurin Bevan's 'In Place of Fear'. For a individual who has stated that he does not consider himself a Marxist, we have 6 out of the 10 books written by Marx or by someone who would label themselves Marxist. The list isn't all obvious however. Benn often praises what he calls the teachers in history, as examples, Gallileo, Marx and Darwin. The Origin of the Species is without doubt one of the most vital, influential and important books ever written but it is still curious to see it in Benn's top ten. I wonder if this illuminating piece of science is there to offset his more widely acknowledged religious background? Out of all, the most eyebrow raising of all is the inclusion of Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler. The key to this is how it's contents serve as a warning, a timely warning to us all about what can happen when people lose hope in their lives. Benn commented on this in the Labour History Journal; "my background had a strong international basis, a strong dissenting basis and an understanding that fascism comes when there is despair. I bought Mein Kampf when I was 11 and I read it occasionally because it shows when people are utterly cynical and utterly despairing then a demigog can come along and find an enemy and build a power structure. And that helps me to understand the attacks on asylum seekers now". In an interview for this webste he also commented; 'That use of democracy is not acceptable to power. Hitler said in Mein Kamf, an extraordinary phrase which I have cos I bought it aged 11, he said ‘democracy inevitably leads to Marxism‘, you work that out. What he meant was that if people have the vote, they’ll challenge the people with wealth'. |
| TONY BENN'S TOP TEN NON-FICTION BOOKS |
| We thought it would be interesting to ask site visitors to send us their favourite non-fiction books to include those lists on the site also. Please email your lists and we'll post them up |
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| Many thanks to Ray Joseph for allowing us to use the list and for kind messages in support of this site. Ray requested the list from Tony Benn for his own website Rhondda Records. You can access the website here |
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