I very much enjoyed this history-inspired fictional anthology from Manchester-based indie publishers Comma Press. Resist: Stories of Uprising, edited by Ra Page, is at once an entertaining collection of short stories and an education on Britain’s political history.
The book’s contributors bring to life iconic moments in the history of protest and resistance movements, ranging from Boudica’s rising in 60AD to Grenfell in 2017. The stories imagine the people behind the dates and events, often adding personal conflicts to the political, showing us that doing what you feel to be right is not always the easy choice and that sometimes what is right may not be clear.
Britain is not exactly renowned as a hotbed of revolutionary activity, but this book is a reminder that we often overlook our own history of radical politics and action. Perhaps uprising and resistance do not fit the established “respectable” British narrative.
The kneejerk reaction here, of course, is to cry out, “why don’t they teach this in schools?” The thing is, they do. Sort of. Many of the events (although by no means all) in this book were familiar to me from studying A Level History, where one of the six modules focussed on political protest and extremism in Britain and Ireland in the period 1815-1939. It was a fascinating module taught by an enthusiastic teacher whose name featured on the reading list (quite a novelty when studying history below university level, I would imagine).
You may have already spotted the issue, though. A Level History, some four years or so after history has stopped being a compulsory subject for students in England. And yet is it not essential that all young people enter the adult world – and the electoral roll – with at least some sense of the political history of the state they live in? I do not have a neat and readymade solution, but I believe that Peterloo, Cato Street, the Chartists, Cable Street, the Merthyr Rising, and many more from Resist’s pages, are names that should resonate with everyone in the UK, not just with those who have an academic or recreational interest in history.
We cannot understand our political present without putting it in context. We cannot talk about workers’ rights and social reforms if we do not realise that they are seldom given if not fought for. If we do not talk about fascist marches and race riots, we can, in blissful malignant ignorance, think that sort of thing didn’t and doesn’t happen here. At least until it reaches the curriculum for all students, I hope there will be a copy of Resist in every secondary school and college in Britain.
I could go on, but I would be doing this book a disservice if all I talked about were how vital the history is; after all, these are fictional stories in historical settings. Each story is proceeded by a historian’s note placing it in context, but, while these are interesting and very welcome, the stories are the main event. That said, history and fiction here are inextricably linked, with each at the service of the other.
Prof. Malcolm Chase, in his afterword to Kamila Shamsie’s excellent story inspired by the Cato Street Conspriacy of 1820, states ‘only a fictional account can take us close to the deeper-felt realities of lived experience’, and I feel that is a fitting message for this anthology.
Shamsie’s story was one of my favourites in this collection, along with those by Irfan Master on Blair Peach, Zoe Lambert on Seeds of Hope, Karline Smith on the Notting Hill Riots, Kim Squirrell on the Tolpuddle Martyrs, Uschi Gatward on the Great Chartist Meeting and Jude Brown on the Liverpool Transport Strike.
The most successful pieces were usually those which managed to seamlessly weave into the narrative enough of the history to give a sense of the occasion to the uninitiated reader without feeling like a non-fictional account. Most of them do this, exploring personal nuances and the roles and lives of individuals, sometimes from the perspective of a participant, sometimes their family, sometimes a bystander, without losing sight of the events which brought you to the book in the first place. It is a balancing act, but one that is carried off with few wobbles and yields rewarding results.
Resist is out today in paperback and I would recommend it to all, these are stories worth reading and history worth knowing. I hope it is read widely, it carries something that should be kept alive.