This is not the book I thought it would be. Which isn’t the book’s fault, but does affect how I think about it.

I thought I was getting a … straightforward history of the Communist Party of Australia. And that’s certainly a significant part of this book. But what the book is ultimately focussed on is the way Communism, and Marxist ideas, has often been done badly in Australia. O’Lincoln is very upfront about the fact that he is very unimpressed by most of the leadership of the CPA, especially from the 1970s onwards. Of note: the book was published in this format in 2009 but was actually written in 1985, which itself definitely and necessarily has an impact.

The other problem is that the book presupposes quite a lot of knowledge – both philosophical and historical – that I don’t really have. Again, that’s partly a factor of it having been written 30 years ago, so the intended audience would have had more immediate knowledge of things that I just don’t. But there’s also no interest in defining “left” and “right”, assuming that the reader will have a shared understanding of what that means – and I have to tell you, reading about a Communist party veering to the right is always weird (yes, I do understand how that works). There’s no attempt here at leading the reader into understanding the various issues (like the difference between socialism and communism, and why you would regard liberal reformism as bad) – because the reader is assumed to already be on O’Lincoln’s wavelength. Again, not necessarily bad, but does suggest a very specific audience.

Worth reading? If you’re interested in the development of the CPA over time, probably yes. But prepare yourself for some pretty heavy philosophical lifting.