Review of The Red and the Green – Portrait of John Maclean by Gerard Cairns
Gerard Cairns has recently published his informative and challenging new book, The Red and the Green – A Portrait of John Maclean. I have known Gerry since the early 1990s and I would find it hard to call him Gerard, so I will use Gerry for the rest of this review.
The book’s title reveals the two main aspects of Gerry’s assessment of John Maclean. The Red and the Green highlights Gerry’s research into ‘Red’ John and his relationship with the ‘Green’ or Irish community on Clydeside .[1] A Portrait of John Maclean examines Maclean the political activist and family man. It raises questions about how Socialists organise and relate to others, especially their partners and families. When assessing Maclean, Gerry brings his own personal experience to bear. “This has been a very personal portrait of a man I have researched, studied, lectured on, debated for a long time.” [2] Thus Gerry’s book is viewed through the prism of his own life of political activism. Continue reading “ALLAN ARMSTRONG REVIEWS ‘THE RED AND THE GREEN’ BY GERARD CAIRNS”
Tags: 'Forward', 'The Cheviot the Stag and the Black Black Oil, 'The Red Book on Scotland', 1913-4 Dublin Lock Out, 1916 Easter Rising, 40 Hours strike 1919, Alan McCombes, Anti-Poll Tax campaign, Author: Allan Armstrong, Author: Gerry Cairns, Barney Friel, Belfast, Brian Higgins, British road to socialism, British Socialist Party, Catholic Socialist Society, Constance Markiewicz, CPGB, Democratic Revolution, Devolution, Douglas Henderson MP, Dublin, Eddi Reader, Edinburgh, First Irish Republic 1919, First World War, Gaelic language, George Barnes MP, Glasgow, Guth na Bliadhna, Hamish Henderson, Hamish Watt MP, Harry Macshane, Henry Hyndman, High MacDiarmid, Home Rule, Independent Labour Party, IndyRef1, Irish Republican Brotherhood, Irish Volunteers, James Connolly, Jim Larkin, Joe Robinson, John Broom, John MacLean, John Wheatley, Justice, Karl Kautsky, Labour Party, Land Leagues, Lenin, Lieutenant Colonel Cecil L'Estrange Malone MP, Limerick Soviet 1919, Mao-Tse-Tung, Nan Milton, Norman Irons, Peter Petroff, Ray Burnett, Red Clydeside, Republican Faction, Sandy Bells, Scottish Labour Party, Scottish Marxist, Scottish Militant Labour, Scottish Review, Seamus Reader, SNP, Socialist Labour Party, Socialist Workers Party, Star Club, Stephen Coyle, Steve Freeman, Sylvia Pankhurst, T. S. Law, The Call, The Great Unrest, The Red and the Green: A Portrait of John Maclean, Theodore Rothstein, Thurso Berwick, Tom Johnston, Tommy Sheridan, Tony Cliff, Trotsky, UCS Work-In 1972, Waverley Bar Edinburgh, Winnie Ewing
