C.L.R. James is cherished in Britain as a cricket writer of unusual wisdom and vitality. It is the proposition of Farrukh Dhondy's beautifully written and enchanting book that this approach is rather like remembering Dickens as an above average parliamentary sketch-writer or Engels as a master of foxhounds.

The bulk of this work is devoted to examining C.L.R.'s career as political theorist and revolutionary. From the moment he arrived in London from Trinidad as a young writer in the 1930s, he sought to foment world revolution. Initially sponsored by the great West Indian cricketer Learie Constantine, he made rapid headway in fashionable left-wing circles. He picked up the language of the class war from friends like James Maxton, Fenner Brockway and George Padmore. A fluent and prolific writer, he was published by Warburg.

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