The Writings of Chairman Mao Tse-tung

Comrade Mao Tse-tung
Comrade Mao Tse-tung

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The Great ‘Marxist-Leninist’ Theoreticians

The Writings of Chairman Mao Tse-tung

Chairman Mao Tse-tung was one of the small group of towering giants produced as a result of the struggles of the workers and peasants throughout the world in the 19th and early 20th centuries. (The others were Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, Joseph Stalin and Enver Hoxha.)

Selected Works – published during the period of Socialism

The decision to published a comprehensive collected of the written works of Chairman Mao Tse-tung was taken in the early days of the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution, appearing in many world languages in a very short period of time. However, the 4 volumes produced during that period only went up to 16th September 1949, a couple of weeks before the Declaration of the People’s Republic. For this reason the ‘official’ Selected Works only includes these 4 volumes.

Selected Works, Volume 1, FLP, Peking, 1967, 362 pages.

The First and Second Revolutionary Civil War Period – March 1926 – August 1937.

Includes many important works such as:

Analysis of classes in Chinese Society

A Single Spark can Start a Prairie Fire

On Practice

On Contradiction

Selected Works, Volume 2, FLP, Peking, 1967, 484 pages.

The Period of the War of Resistance Against Japan (I) – July 23rd 1937 – May 8th 1941

Includes many important works such as:

Combat Liberalism

Problems of Strategy in Guerrilla War Against Japan

On Protracted War

On New Democracy

Selected Works, Volume 3, FLP, Peking, 1967, 304 pages.

The Period of the War of Resistance Against Japan (II) – March 1941 – August 9th 1945

Includes many important works such as:

Reform Our Study

Talks at Yenan Forum on Literature and Art

On Coalition Government

The Foolish Man who Removed the Mountains

Selected Works, Volume 4, FLP, Peking, 1969, 472 pages.

The Third Revolutionary Civil War Period – August 13th 1845 – September 16th 1949

Includes many important works such as:

Talk with the American Correspondent Anna Louise Strong

Correct the ‘Left’ Errors in Land Reform Propaganda

Carry the Revolution Through to the End

Index to Selected Works (and Selected Military Writings)

An academically produced index of the four ‘official’ volumes of the Selected Works of Chairman Mao Tse-tung which might be found useful.

Index to Selected Works of Chairman Mao, Union Research Institute, Hong Kong, 1968, 190 pages.

Selected Works – produced in the early stages of the counter-revolution

Only one further volume of the Selected Works of Chairman Mao Tse-tung was produced by the state-run Foreign Languages Press in Peking. It was produced whilst the coup for the leadership of the Communist Party of China was still in progress. Produced within a year of the Chairman’s death was probably too short a time for serious political ‘revision’ to have occurred but this has to be considered when referring to contentious issues that might appear in this volume. Although there was an intention to continue the production of the Selected Works nothing else appeared after Volume 5. (The ‘Publication Note’ on pages 5-6 gives an idea of the situation of flux at the time of publication.)

Selected Works, Volume 5, FLP, Peking, 1977, 534 pages.

The period of the Socialist revolution and Socialist Construction (I) – September 21st 1949 – November 18th 1957

Includes interesting, and some important, works such as:

Liu Shao-chi and Yang Shang-kun Criticized for breach of Discipline in Issuing Documents in the Name of the Central Committee Without Authorization

Combat Bourgeois Ideas in the Party

On the Correct handling of Contradictions Among the People

Concordance of proper nouns in the five-volume English language Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung, compiled by Harry M Lindquist and Roger D Mayer, Centre for East Asian Studies, University of Kansas, 1968, 72 pages.

Selected Works – collected together outside of China

Once it became clear that the Chinese Revisionists would not be publishing more of Chairman Mao’s Selected Works (or that they couldn’t be trusted if they did) various groupings around the world made attempts to glean through the mass of paperwork and try to determine what might have been produced by the Chairman. This was not as difficult as it might first be thought. Chairman Mao had a very distinctive style and anyone steeped in his work would be able to make a more than intelligent guess whether a work was by him or not. This was especially the case during the early days of the Cultural Revolution when many editorials or unsigned articles were almost certainly from the pen of the great Socialist leader.

The first of those (under the name Volume VI) goes away from the style of the first Five volumes in that it attempts to pick up articles and writings that might have been omitted from those earlier volumes.

Selected Works, Volume VI, Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, India, 1990, 343 pages.

From April 1917 – April 1946

Includes titles such as:

Oppose Book Worship

The League of Nations is a League of Robbers

To be Attacked by the Enemy is not a bad Thing but a Good Thing

A revised, and more complete, edition was published in 2020.

Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung: Volume VI (2020), Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, India, 2020, 448 pages.

Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung: Volume VII (2020), Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, India, 2020, 464 pages.

Letters, telegrams and directives from September 23rd 1949 to November 17th 1957.

Volume VIII is a work in progress but we have access to to downloadable version, of what has already been produced, so that is included here.

Selected Works, Volume VIII – partial, Maoist Documentation Project, 2004, 353 pages.

From January 1958-1961

Includes titles such as:

Red and Expert

Communes are Better

Critique of Stalin’s ‘Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR’

Volume IX, produced in India in 1994, returns to the format first used in China in 1967. What’s important about this edition is that this is the first attempt to cover some of the crucial years of the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in any depth.

Selected Works, Volume IX, Sramika Varga Prachuranulu, Hyderabad, 1994, 474 pages.

From May 1963 – September 12th 1971

Includes articles such as:

Where do the Correct ideas Come From?

The Soviet Leading Clique is a Mere Dust Heap

Talk at a Meeting of the Central Cultural Revolution Group

Speech to the Albanian Military Delegation

The Writings of Mao Zedong, 1949-1976, Volume 1, September 1949-December 1955, edited by Michael Y. M. Kau and John K Leung, ME Sharpe, New York, 1986, 771 pages.

The Writings of Mao Zedong, 1949-1976, Volume 2, Janauary 1956-December 1957, edited by Michael Y. M. Kau and John K Leung, ME Sharpe, New York, 1992, 863 pages.

A critique of soviet economics by Mao Tse-tung, with an introduction by James Peck, Monthly Review Press, New York, 1977, 157 pages.

Mao’s critique of two Soviet books; Political Economy – A Textbook and Joseph Stalin’s Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR.

Mao Zedong On Diplomacy, FLP, Beijing, 1998, 516 pages.

This is a strange one, taking into account where (Beijing) and when (a 1998 translation of the Chinese edition of 1994) it was published. This doesn’t mean that the translations are not accurate or complete (although they might be) but in reading them we must have, at the back of our mind, why were they produced at that particular time.

Mao Zedong on Dialectical Materialism, Nick Knight, ME Sharpe, New York, 1990, 295 pages.

A detailed look at some of the essays that Chairman Mao produced whilst in Yenan in 1937. This was to culminate in the seminal works of On Contradiction and On Practice.

For Mao – Essays In Historical Materialism, Philip Corrigan, Harvie Ramsey and Derek Sayer, Humanities press, New Jersey, 1979, 207 pages.

Chairman Mao talks to the people – Talks and Letters – 1956-1971, edited by Stuart Schram, Pantheon Books, New York, 1974, 352 pages.

A collection of documents which were published in China as part of the struggle against counter-revolutionaries within the Party during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.

The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao – From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward, edited by Roderick MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek and Eugene Wu, Harvard Contemporary China Series No 6, 1989, 561 pages.

Speeches from 1957 and 1958.

Mao Papers – Anthology and Bibliography, edited by Jerome Ch’en, Oxford University Press, London, 1970, 221 pages.

The Thought of Mao Tse-tung, Anna Louise Strong, Communist Party of Great Britain, ND, 36 pages.

The following volumes contain various material produced by Chairman Mao in the years before the declaration of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949. They have been collected from numerous sources and their validity and accuracy cannot be verified. As with all collections of Mao’s writing published after his death, whether in China or outside, these have to be treated with care. The very title of the books (Mao’s Road to Power) should already start the alarm bells ringing. There are too many entities with an agenda to distort what he had written but are included here with the aim of making as much material as possible available to those with an interest in the ideas of one of the most significant thinkers of the 20th century.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 1, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 1 – The pre-Marxist period, 1912-1920. edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1992, 639 pages.

Early writings of the young Mao Tse-tung as he was developing his own ideas before adopting Marxism as the basis of his ideology.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 2, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 2 – National Revolution and Social Revolution, December 1920 – June 1927, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1994, 543 pages.

The period in the 1920s when Mao was involved with both the Kuomintang and the young Chinese Communist Party, having an impact upon both.

The following volume (No 3) is in two parts due to file size limitations.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 3 – Part 1

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 3 – Part 2

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 3 – From the Jinggangshan to the establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets July 1927 – December 1930, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1995, 771 pages.

Writings by Mao about the development of the Chinese Communist Party.

The start of Mao’s interest, and study, of military strategy and tactics.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 4, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 4 – The Rise and Fall of the Chinese Soviet Republic 1931-1934, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1997, 1004 pages.

The period of the Chinese Soviet republic in Jianxi and inner-Party struggles within the Communist Party of China

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 5, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 5 – Toward the Second United Front, January 1935 – July 1937, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1999, 737 pages.

Covering the period of The Long March.

The following two volumes (Nos. 6 and 7) are also in two parts due to file size limitations.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 6 – Part 1

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 6 – Part 2

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 6 – The New Stage, August 1937 – 1938, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 2004, 867 pages.

The time of the United Front with the Kuomintang against Japanese aggression.

The period in which Mao outlined his interpretation of Dialectical Materialism in works such as On Contradiction and On Practice.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 7 – Part 1

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 7 – Part 2

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 7 – New Democracy, 1939-1941, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 2004, 897 pages.

The period of the development of guerrilla warfare and the establishment of base areas behind Japanese lines.

The tactic of flexible united fronts with the Kuomintang and various other groupings.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 8

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 8 – From Rectification to Coalition Government, 1942-July 1945, edited by Stuart Schram, Routledge, New York, 2015, 1436 pages.

When Chairman Mao stressed the necessity of aligning Marxist-Leninist theory with the Chinese reality, the Rectification Campaign.

The Thought of Mao Tse-Tung, Stuart Schram, Cambridge University Press, London, 1989, 242 pages.

Poetry

Mao Tse-tung Poems, FLP, Peking, 1976, 53 pages.

Many people may be surprised to learn that Chairman Mao was also an accomplished poet. Although one of the world’s most revolutionary thinkers his poetry very much follows the traditional style developed over the centuries.

Selected Readings

In the late 1960s/early 70s, as well as producing the Four Volumes of the Selected Works, the Foreign Languages Press also produced a volume of Selected Readings. This single volume contained many of the most important, and most studied, of Chairman Mao’s writings during the period of the Cultural Revolution – not just in China but in many countries of the world.

Selected Readings, FLP, Peking, 1971, 504 pages.

Mao Tse-Tung on Revolution and War, edited and with notes by M Rejai, Doubleday, New York, 1970, 452 pages.

A selection of articles prompted by the events of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.

Writings on Military Affairs

It is sometimes forgotten that as well as being the principal theoretical leader of the Chinese Revolution Chairman Mao was also a very able military commander. During his lifetime various collections of writings devoted to military affair were published. Although useful in a military sense to this day it is important top remember Chairman Mao’s dictum of always ‘putting politics in command’ – without that military success will always be transitory.

Selected Military Writings, FLP, Peking, 1963, 408 pages.

Contains articles such as:

Why is it Red Political Power can Exist in China?

On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party

Problems of War and Strategy

Manifesto of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army

On Protracted War, FLP, Peking, 1967, 116 pages.

Not just a treatise on warfare but one of Chairman Mao’s most important contributions to Marxist-Leninist theory.

Six Essays on Military Affairs, FLP, Peking, 1972, 393 pages.

Six of the most important and relevant essays that Chairman Mao wrote related to the successful outcome of a military campaign.

On Guerrilla Warfare, US marine Corps, Washington, 1989, 128 pages.

A pamphlet with the basic principles of Guerrilla Warfare that was widely disseminated throughout ‘Free’ China after it was first published in 1937. Produced by the US military, thereby proving the importance of ‘knowing your enemy’. Surprisingly not published in the Selected Works.

Mao Zedong’s Art Of War, Liu Jikun, Hai Feng, Hong Kong, 1993, 277 pages.

A look at Chairman Mao’s military strategy as it was put into practice in the National Liberation War against the Japanese invaders and then the Civil War against the reactionary Kuomintang forces under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek.

Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung – The ‘Little Red Book’

Produced in millions, in dozens of languages, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, here we have short quotations that distil the essence of Mao Tse-tung Thought.

Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, FLP, Peking, 1966, 312 pages.

Literature and Art

From the very early days of the struggle to free his country from foreign domination Chairman Mao was aware of the importance of literature and art in any National Liberation struggle as it enabled the oppressed people to establish their own, independent identity. This was developed as the successful struggle of the Chinese People against the Japanese invaders developed into a Civil War for the establishment of a Socialist state. The importance of literature and art probably reached its apogee in China during the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution when the likes of Peking Opera was adapted to represent the struggles and desires of the working people. That theoretical basis came from Mao’s writings during the Anti-Japanese war of Resistance.

Mao Tse-Tung on Art and Literature, FLP, Peking, 1960, 145 pages. (Contains a lot of underlining.) An early compilation, with slightly different contents from the 1967 version (below).

On Literature And Art, FLP, Peking, 1967, 162 pages.

Includes:

Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art – May 1942

Reform Our Study

Oppose Stereotyped Party Writing

The Problem of Culture, Education and the Intellectuals

Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art, FLP, Peking, 1967, 42 pages.

Two presentations given at the conference in May 1942.

Five documents on Literature and Art, FLP, Peking, 1967, 12 pages.

Five very short articles addressing the issue of the importance of literature and art in the building of Socialism

Mao Zedong’s Talks at the Yan’an Conference on Literaure and Art, a translation of the 1943 text with commentary, Bonnie S McDougall, Centre for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1980, 112 pages.

A new translation of Chairman Mao’s ‘Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art’ together with a commentary on the elements of literary theory that it contains.

On Philosophy

Separating Chairman Mao’s writings into different ‘categories’ is always going to be problematic as all aspects of the struggle are inter-related. This pamphlet, of four essays, was one of those most studied during the period of the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution.

Four Essays on Philosophy, FLP, Peking, 1966, 136 pages.

Contains:

On Practice

On Contradiction

On the correct handing of contradictions among the people

Where do the correct ideas come from?

The Wisdom of Mao Tse-tung, Philosophical Library, New York, 1968, 114 pages. (Quite a lot of underlining.)

Contains the three important articles; On Practice, On Contradiction and On New Democracy.

Five Essays on Philosophy, Foreign Languages Press, Utrecht, 2018, 189 pages.

On Contradiction Study Companion, Redspark Collective, Foreign Languages Press, Paris, 2019.

Individual Pamphlets

Before the publication of the Selected Works and Selected Readings (downloadable above) many individual pamphlets were produced of the writings of Chairman Mao in the early 1960s, in advance of the Cultural Revolution. Some of those are reproduced below. More will be added as and when they become available.

China and the Second Imperialist World War, International Publishers, New York, 1939, 50 pages.

Addresses and interviews by Chairman Mao between May and October 1939.

China’s New Democracy, Progress Books, Toronto, 1944, 72 pages.

An article written by Chairman Mao in 1940 before the war in Europe expanded to include the Soviet Union and before its extension as a World War.

People’s Democratic Dictatorship, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1950, 40 pages.

Speeches made by Chairman Mao in 1949, just before the declaration of the People’s Republic of China.

On the tactics of fighting Japanese Imperialism, FLP, Peking, 1960, 41 pages.

Comrade Mao Tse-tung here explains, in great detail, the possibility and the importance of re-establishing a united front with the national bourgeoisie on the condition of resisting the Japanese.

On Strengthening the Party Committee System, FLP, Peking, 1961, 9 pages.

NO revolution of workers and peasants has achieved a modicum of success, with a chance of lasting more than the 61 days (which includes a week of slaughter of the Communards) of the Paris Commune in France (1871), WITHOUT an organised M-L Party. Get it wrong and the revolution will fail, thousands of workers will die and the revolution will be put back more than a generation.

Our study and the current situation, Appendix: Resolution on certain questions in the history of our Party, FLP, Peking, 1962, 90 pages.

This was a speech made by Comrade Mao Tse-tung at a meeting of senior cadres in Yenan on April 12th 1944 on the subject of the discussions about the history of the ‘Left’ elements within the Party between 1931 and 1934.

Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan, FLP, Peking, 1965, 52 pages.

This article was written in March 1927 as a reply to the carping criticisms both inside and outside the Party then being levelled at the peasants’ revolutionary struggle. Comrade Mao Tse-tung spent thirty-two days in Hunan Province making an investigation and wrote this report in order to answer these criticisms.

Notes On Mao Tse-tung’s ‘Report on an investigation of the peasant movement in Hunan’, Chen Po-ta, FLP, Peking, 1966, 56 pages.

Preface and Postscripts to Rural Surveys, FLP, Peking, 1966, 8 pages.

Written by Chairman Mao in 1941 in an effort to encourage Party comrades to understand the contemporary situation rather than get caught in thinking that matters don’t change.

A Single Spark can start a Prairie Fire, FLP, Peking, 1966, 18 pages.

Even when is looks like there are so many problems surrounding us that a revolutionary change is impossible we have to remember from a small acorn a mighty oak can grow – all it needs is the right conditions – and under capitalism those conditions are created by the next crisis around the corner!

Chairman Mao Tse-tung’s important talks with guests from Asia, Africa and Latin America, FLP, Peking, 1966, 9 pages.

In May and June 1960 in Tsinan, Chengchow, Wuhan and Shanghai, Chairman Mao received delegations and other friends from the countries and regions in Latin America and Africa and from Japan, Iraq, Iran and Cyprus, who were then visiting China.

Current Problems of Tactics in the Anti-Japanese United Front, FLP, Peking, 1966, 14 pages.

Chairman Mao wrote this outline for a report he made on March 11th 1940 at a meeting of the Party’s senior cadres in Yenan.

For the Mobilization of all the Nation’s Forces for victory in the War of Resistence, FLP, Peking, 1966, 10 pages.

This was an outline for propaganda and agitation written by Chairman Mao on August 25th 1937 for the propaganda organs of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. It was approved by the enlarged meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee at Lochuan, northern Shensi.

On the question of Agricultural Co-operation, FLP, Peking, 1966, 36 pages.

This was a report delivered by Chairman Mao on July 31st 1955 at a conference of secretaries of provincial, municipal and autonomous regional committees of the Communist Party of China.

Talk with the American Correspondent Anna Louise Strong, FLP, Peking, 1967, 8 pages.

Two conversations of Chairman Mao with an American journalist, when the war of liberation against the Japanese invaders had been won and the war against the US/UK /Western imperialist war was taking place against the Kuomintang – the US puppets of what became Taiwan – was still in full force. She was a true friend or revolutionary China and wrote many books to this effect.

The Orientation of the Youth Movement, FLP, Peking, 1967, 16 pages.

This was a speech delivered by the Chairman on May 4th 1939 at a mass meeting of youth in Yenan to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the May 4th Movement. It represented a development in his ideas on the question of the Chinese Revolution.

Analysis of the Classes in Chinese Society, FLP, Peking, 1967, 13 pages.

ALL revolutionary movements, whatever country or epoch, need to understand the society in which they are working. A knowledge and understanding of the balance of class forces is vital for the success, or failure, of the revolution.

Why is it Red Political Power can exist in China? FLP, Peking, 1967, 15 pages.

This article was part of the resolution, originally entitled ‘The Political Problems and the Tasks of the Border Area Party Organization’, which was drafted by Comrade Mao Tse-tung on October 5, 1928 for the Second Party Congress of the Hunan-Kiangsi Border Area.

On the People’s Democratic Dictatorship, FLP, Peking, 1967, 21 pages.

This article was written on June 30th 1949 to commemorate the twenty-eighth anniversary of the Communist Party of China.

To be attacked by the enemy is not a bad thing but a good thing, FLP, Peking, 1967, 5 pages.

To be attacked by the enemy is not a bad thing but a good thing.

You know when you are following a correct line when the capitalist and imperialist attack your policies.

Three fundamental articles, FLP, Peking, 1967, 12 pages.

Three revolutionary ‘parables’;

Serve the people

In memory of Norman Bethune

The foolish old man who removed the mountains.

Urgent Tasks following the Establishment of Kuomintang-Communist Co-operation, FLP, Peking, 1968, 16 pages.

The need for China to resolve internal differences in order to present a United Front against the principal enemy, the Japanese imperialist aggressors

Win the masses in their millions for the Anti-Japanese National United Front, FLP, Peking, 1968, 14 pages.

This was the concluding speech made by Chairman Mao at the National Conference of the Communist Party of China held in May 1937.

People of the world unite and defeat the US aggressors and all their running dogs

A call by the Chairman for the people of the world to stand up against US imperialism. As valid now as when it was written. Published as a supplement to the weekly political and informative magazine ‘Peking Review’.

People of the world unite and defeat the US aggressors and all their running dogs Published in China Reconstructs, 1970, No. 5, Supplement No. 2.

Marxism and the Liberation of Women, Quotations from Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, VI Lenin, Joseph Stalin and Mao Tse-tung, Union of Women for Liberation, London, n.d., mid-1970s?, 64 pages. Includes a statement of aims of the Union of Women for Liberation.

Record of the Conversation from Chairman Mao’s Audience with the Albanian Women’s Delegation and Albanian Film Workers, May 15 1964, Wilson Centre Digital Archive, ND, 7 pages.

On the Communist Press, Lenin, Stalin and Mao Tsetung, Canadian Communist League (Marxist-Leninist), n.d., 200 pages.

The works of Chairman Mao in languages other than English

The writings of Chairman Mao Tse-tung were produced in many different languages. Here we present a few in Spanish.

Citas del Presidente Mao Tse-tung, Ediciones en Lenguas Extanjeras, Pekin, 1967, 208 pages.

‘El pequeño libro rojo’ de citas de las obras del Presidente Mao Tse-tung.

Comentarios sobre el Manual de Economia Politica Sovietico, Lima SA, Peru, ND, 166 pages.

Los comentarios del Presidente Mao sobre el Manual de Economía Política Soviético (un libro de texto por Comunistas) y sobre el libro Problemas Económicos del Socialismo en la URSS de José Stalin.

La guerra de guerrillas, Editorial Huemul, Buenos Aires, 1973, 91 pages.

Un pequeño libro con los principios fundamentales de La guerra de guerrillas, originalmente publicada en 1937.

Cinco Tésis Filosòficas, Lima, Peru, ND, 112 pages.

Sobre la Práctica

Sobre la Contradicción

Sobre el tratamiento correcto de las contradicciones en el seno del pueblo

Discurso ante la conferencia nacional del PCP sobre el trabajo de propaganda

¿De dónde provienen las ideas correctas?

The death of Chairman Mao Tse-tung

The edition of Peking Review that announced the death of Comrade Mao Tse-tung, Peking Review, No 38, 1976.

Eternal Glory to the Great Leader and Teacher Chairman Mao Tse-tung, FLP, Peking, 1976, 40 pages.

Memorial speech by Hua Kuo-feng and the decision to construct the memorial hall in Tien an Men Square, Peking.

Contemporary Translations and Commentaries

Chairman Mao’s Primary Directives, Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party: Document 4 (1976), issued by the General Office of the Central Committee, March 3, 1976, 2 pages. Includes critical comments by Mao on Deng Xiaoping and his associates.

Mao’s Talk with Members of the Politburo who were in Peking, May 3, 1975 – with extensive notes and context information added, 15 pages.

More on China …..

The Great ‘Marxist-Leninist’ Theoreticians

30th January 1649 – Execution of Charles Stuart

Execution of Charles Stuart, 30th January 1649

Execution of Charles Stuart, 30th January 1649

More on the ‘Revolutionary Year’

30th January 1649 – Execution of Charles Stuart

The 30th January marks the 372nd anniversary of the execution of Charles Stuart, the ‘tyrant, traitor, murderer and public enemy’, who had claimed to rule what later became known as the United Kingdom by ‘divine right’ – that he was chosen by the Christian God and therefore could do what he wanted. In defending his right to absolute power he caused destruction to rain on his country, causing death and suffering in an unprecedented scale on the general population.

Executions, and public ones at that, were not rare occurrences in England in the 17th century, but it wasn’t normal to decapitate those who had ‘been anointed by God’, although those individuals in previous centuries had had no reluctance to do so to others who might have displeased the Royal authority. However, Charles Stuart was the first king to face such a fate and be executed through the authority of the people.

The propaganda machine behind monarchies worked hard through the centuries to give kings – who were basically leaders of the most successful gangs of thugs, murderers, rapists and thieves at a particular time – an element of legitimacy that still exists to the present day. In Britain present day royalists loudly proclaim that the UK has the longest, unbroken line of monarchy in the world. This conveniently forgets that from the time of the first king (who might be Egbert in 827 or Alfred the Great in 871, depending upon whose authority you believe) this line is not from the same family – as it is popularly and misguidedly believed.

Gang leaders fell out and ended up killing erstwhile friends and allies; invaders from other parts of Europe came in wanting a slice of the action; wars raged across the country for decades as different pretenders to the throne slugged it out, until one of them lay dead in the mud of the battlefield; at times ‘kings’ were invited in by minor gang leaders as the only way to avoid more costly and fruitless internecine strife; one time the ‘chosen’ one was number 54 in line of succession, all the ones with a lower number being Roman Catholics – so in place of choosing someone based on merit the eventual candidate got the job merely because he wasn’t a ‘Papist’; at one time the royal family had to change its name from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor as they feared the young soldiers being sent to live (and many to die) with the rats in the mud, water and noise of the trenches in France, fighting against likewise ill-fated German workers, might wonder why the King they were dying for had a German name.

Charles Stuart was the son of one of those monarchs brought in when a space had to be filled.

But Stuart had an abundance of arrogance that comes from being told you are God’s anointed. He spent most of his reign (from 1625) in opposition to Parliament as he struggled to get the finances he needed to avoid bankruptcy. Here he was not after money to improve the condition of the people but to finance wars against Spain, France and then against the Irish – kings are very keen on wars. (Unfortunately, after Stuart’s death the then republican leaders of the country continued their reactionary policy which led, first, to the needless death of many thousands of Irishmen and women but also the demise of the republic itself.)

When Stuart failed in his many attempts to get his own way he ran away from London and then, when he was able to collect around himself enough armed toadies, he instigated the First Civil War, 1642-46.

As we know from any cursory study of history civil wars are particularly pernicious and tend to be more costly in terms of casualties and last longer when inter-State wars would look for a way out, or at least a truce for a short time before starting again. That was the case, more or less, up to the 20th century when all common sense seemed to drown in the water-filled shell holes of the Western Front. Civil Wars tend to divide communities and this means that revenge comes into the equation when cities and towns change hands following the fluctuating fortunes of the two sides involved.

The Royalist had a few success but ultimately were defeated in May 1646. Stuart was imprisoned and it was suggested to him by the Parliamentarians that he accept the imposition of a Constitutional Monarchy – where he could sit on the throne but which would require him to renounce his ‘divine right’.

His arrogance meant that he would never accept such a situation and was obviously given too much freedom during his captivity and although still technically in the hands of his enemies was able to communicate with those followers who had not been eliminated and this resulted in the Second Civil War – a shorter conflict than the First not least because many Royalists refused to break their parole (an agreement not to take up arms against Parliament in return for their freedom to live a normal life). Stuart broke his parole and was therefore not trusted by many Parliamentarians and this inevitably led to his trial – a novel idea at the time.

After the fighting ended Stuart was imprisoned in Hurst Castle in Hampshire whilst his ultimate fate was decided upon in London and at the end of 1648 he was escorted by Major General Thomas Harrison, of the Parliamentarian Army, to be closer to the place of his trial.

The trial began on 20th January where he was accused of high treason and using his position to pursue self-interest rather than the good of the people. The indictment stated that he;

‘for accomplishment of such his designs, and for the protecting of himself and his adherents in his and their wicked practices, to the same ends hath traitorously and maliciously levied war against the present Parliament, and the people therein represented”, and that the “wicked designs, wars, and evil practices of him, the said Charles Stuart, have been, and are carried on for the advancement and upholding of a personal interest of will, power, and pretended prerogative to himself and his family, against the public interest, common right, liberty, justice, and peace of the people of this nation.’

Further, the indictment held him ‘guilty of all the treasons, murders, rapines, burnings, spoils, desolations, damages and mischiefs to this nation, acted and committed in the said wars, or occasioned thereby.’

There will forever be a debate of how many people actually suffered during the two civil wars for which Stuart was being held responsible – all depending, in many senses, on which side of the Monarchist/Republican fence you place yourselves. After all, during the period in question such statistics were not considered in the same way as they are now and the disruption caused by the very nature of the conflict would have meant that even the best intentions in information collection would be thwarted.

Any figures would also vary depending on whether only military casualties are considered or whether the greater picture is taken into account. At the beginning of the 17th century a huge swathe of the population would have been living an existence barely more than subsistence. Such a condition needs very little to push that subsistence into outright starvation. And starvation leads to susceptibility to disease.

Marauding armies crisscrossing the country would play havoc with agriculture which, remember, was still based on the unproductive and wasteful feudal strip system. Any draft animals would be requisitioned by the armies and surpluses, if achieved, under threat of being stolen by hungry, armed men. Trade would have virtually ceased to exist, even in the locality, as fear of marauders and a poor transport infrastructure would keep people very much at home. As well as that many able-bodied men would be actually fighting instead of working on the land and their deaths or serious injury would have an impact on the rural communities long after the fighting stopped – and the Royalists kept on coming back with more death and destruction – even after the death of the war criminal.

And that was what Stuart was accused of being. He instigated the conflict as a significant proportion of the country wouldn’t play the game by his rules. He refused to accept reality and used the sycophancy and toadyism that always accompanies the monarchy to gather around himself a significant military force. As consequence something like 860,000 men, women and children died – of a population of seven million (in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland) being about 12% of the population, more than any other conflict before or since.

When that level of death and destruction occurred in the 20th century the Fascist perpetrators in Germany and Japan were held to account and tried, convicted and sentenced. Stuart faced his Nuremberg 296 years before the Nazis.

If someone was guilty of such crimes today the international community would be branding him/her a ‘war criminal’ guilty of ‘crimes against humanity’ (as long as the individuals concerned were not citizens of the United States) and demanding that s/he face judgement at a special tribunal of the International Court of Justice located in The Hague, Netherlands. If seems strange, therefore, that some people cast aspersions upon the legitimacy of the trial that took place in London in January, 1649.

Maintaining his arrogance Stuart refused to recognise the jurisdiction of the court and constantly referred to his supposed ‘divine right’.

Charles Stuart Death Warrant

Charles Stuart Death Warrant

Faced with overwhelming evidence he was found guilt and sentenced to death on 26th January. The orders for the execution to take place on Tuesday 30th January were signed and sealed the day before.

That order reads:

At the High Co[ur]t of Justice for the tryinge and iudginge of Charles Steuart, Kinge of England, January xxixth, Anno D[omi]ni 1648

Whereas Charles Steuard, Kinge of England is and standeth convicted, attaynted, and condemned of High Treason, and other high Crymes: and sentence upon Saturday last was pronounced against him by this Co[ur]t, to be putt to death by the severing of his head from his body; of w[hi]ch sentence, execuc[i]on remayneth to be done; these are therefore to will and require you to see the said sentence executed in the open streete before Whitehall, uppon the morrowe, being the Thirtieth day of this instante moneth of January, between the hours of tenn in the morning and five in the afternoone of the same day, w[i]th full effect. And for soe doing this shall be yo[u]r sufficient warrant. And these are to require all officers, souldiers, and other, the good people of this Nation of England, to be assistinge unto you in this service. Given under o[ur] hands and seals.

To Col. Francis Hacker, Col. Hunks, and Lieut-Col. Phayre, and to every of them.

(Here is should be noted that the date at the top of 1648 was correct at that time. The new year was then considered to start on 25th March and this wasn’t changed to what we now use as the beginning of the year, 1st January, until 1752. As an aside, this was at the same time as the Julian Calendar was replaced by the Gregorian – a change which led many people to believe they had been robbed of 11 days of their life.)

Underneath were 57 signatures and seals of the Commissioners (those who sat in judgement) – some signatures were over erasures, so some of them were cowards and couldn’t deal with the seriousness of the crime of which Stuart was convicted. Then, as almost certainly would be the case in a similar situation now, the insidiousness and perniciousness of the tradition of the monarchy being different from us mere mortals playing a role in that decision.

Just before 14.00 on the afternoon of the 30th Stuart walked through the space provided by the removed window on the first floor of the Palace of Westminster on to a specially constructed scaffold. He was accompanied by the same Thomas Harrison who had brought the war criminal from Hurst Castle the month before and would have been the last person with which Stuart would have talked.

Execution of Charles Stuart - contemporary cartoon

Execution of Charles Stuart – contemporary cartoon

Stuart’s head was separated from his body by one sharp blow – so a professional was used, the identity of whom is still not definitively known.

Such was not to be the fate of those 57 signatories still alive in 1660 when the monarchy was invited back to be a parasite on the body politic of the British Isles.

In the discussions with Stuart’s eldest son, also named Charles there was an implied agreement that there would be no retaliation to those who had signed the death warrant of the father, being, as they were, merely servants of the people. When the new king had his feet under the table (and before he started his whoring and followed his favourite hobby of collecting mistresses) he started the process of extracting vengeance on the regicides.

Major General Thomas Harrison

Major General Thomas Harrison

The first to suffer at the hands of the vengeful spoilt brat was the very Thomas Harrison who had accompanied Stuart Elder to the scaffold. But Thomas didn’t get the quick death afforded the war criminal. His punishment was to be hung, drawn and quartered.

This process, which had been around since the early part of the 13th century, had fallen into disuse during the time of the Commonwealth (from 1640-60). Rather than being hung with a drop that would break the neck the victim to be executed was dangled at the end of a rope, being throttled rather than hung. Just before loosing consciousness he (it was always a he, women liable to such punishment (that is, the crime of high treason) were merely burnt at the stake – for the sake of ‘public decency’) would be cut down, castrated and then shown the package, In the case of Thomas his abdomen was slashed open and molten metal poured into the wound. (At this point Thomas lashed out and hit his murderer who then immediately cut off his head – which seems to be a strange sort of punishment but was probably caused by the current level of ignorance and fear that a ‘dead’ man was able to react in such a manner.) The entrails would have been thrown into a nearby fire, his head cut off and the body hacked into four pieces, the separate five pieces then being distributed around the city of London, as a warning to others. The Royalists even took out the revenge on the dead, exhuming those who had died before 1660 and hanging the rotting copses from cages in various parts of London. Cromwell’s severed and preserved head even appearing in fairgrounds way into the 19th century.

Hanging, drawing and quartering was the punishment for high treason so Stuart could quite legally have been submitted to such treatment.

This form of torture existed in Britain until 1870.

At least Thomas died with dignity, the same couldn’t be said of the others in the country who had fought against Stuart but then kowtowed to the new monarch that was installed on the throne in 1660. They might have dies peacefully in their beds but they died as forelock-tuggers, sycophants and gutless cowards.

No one should really have been surprised that the agreement before the Restoration wasn’t honoured. Way back in 1381 Wat Tyler, one of the principal leaders of the Peasants Revolt, met with the boy Richard of Bordeaux. Trusting the monarchy was to be Tyler’s last act as he was treacherously stabbed in the back by William Walworth, the Mayor of London, and then hacked to pieces by surrounding soldiers. The revolt didn’t last long after that. The lesson that should have been learnt then was ‘never trust the monarchy’.

An interesting aspect of the picture at the very top (a contemporary painting of the event) is the image of the fainting woman. When revolutions break out there’s no way anyone can foretell how events will develop. This realisation didn’t exist in the 17th century as such popular uprisings were few and far between, peasant revolts being the only benchmark. Unfortunately, after many more recent workers led revolutions many still don’t understand that ‘a revolution is not a dinner party’ (Mao Tse-tung), that things happen that have never happened before and that a revolution can eat its own.

So events like the execution of a monarch can happen. However, there was a kind of evolution in people’s thinking when the next European king was to lose his head. Women fainted in 1649, they knitted in 1793 when Louis Bourbon had an appointment with Madam Guillotine.

The immediate political fallout of Stuart’s execution was that the English Revolution lost its momentum and direction. There wasn’t a formed ideology before the First Civil War started but once the people had taken on the established order, and especially the monarchy and the whole concept of ‘divine right’, this encouraged a flowering of ideas and debates.

The Levellers, who were probably most influential in the couple of years between the first and second civil wars, argued for what is implied in their name. They wanted a more equal society, with equal participation of those who had previously been marginalised, by both the monarchy and Parliament – which itself represented land owning interests. Many of the young men who joined the Roundheads (the name given to Parliament’s army) were apprentices from the towns. They were given arms and training, had seen parts of the country which without the war would not have happened, were mixing with people who they never would have met in normal life and started to think. But thinking is dangerous and the ruling class doesn’t want the workers to do anything so dangerous.

Soon after the execution Cromwell, who had become the most powerful general in the army due to his successes against the Royalists, had become virtual ruler of the country in Stuart’s place. (Just as it used to happen in Rome.) A mad Puritan – Protestant fundamentalist – he had a hatred of Catholics and there were a lot of Catholics in Ireland who he saw as a potential threat. He planned to send an expeditionary force to Ireland but parts of the army, those parts where Leveller influence was the greatest, refused. After all why had they fought tyranny to become tyrants themselves in another part of the British Isles?

A group of soldiers mutinied and ended up being surrounded by troops loyal to Cromwell in the Church in Burford, Oxfordshire. Three of their leaders were executed, whilst the rest looked on, on 17th May 1649. This was the virtual end of the Leveller movement.

At about the same time the Diggers (sometimes called the True Levellers) perhaps a more radical group of activists, inspired by the almost poetic writings of Gerrard Winstanley, occupied common land on George’s Hill, in Weybridge, Surrey. This experiment was crushed, yet again by troops loyal to Cromwell, the working class always being the ones who trample on movements that seek to take the whole class out of the mire in which they live.

For a short period of time in the 17th century the English had got up off their knees and could have improved their lot if they but had the courage. The execution of Stuart in 1649 seems to have made them dizzy and they knelt down again, only periodically getting off their knees over the next 400 years, but never for long enough to change society.

More on the ‘Revolutionary Year’