The "S" Word by John Nichols

[GPDP]

Has anyone picked up this book yet? I saw it at a bookstore today, and only got to read the back cover. It apparently deals with the American socialist tradition, and how they helped contribute to U.S. society. Only thing is, it is written by a The Nation correspondent, and I'm afraid it'll reek of reformism.

That said, it is at least refreshing to see a book with a positive account of socialism in a bookshelf full of idiotic teabagger bullshit about Obama's evil socialist plan to destroy America.

[Dumb]

I've found that, more often than not, genuinely progressive reformists in the U.S. - such as Nichols, or Bernie Sanders, etc. - have generally good things to say about Marxism and socialism. They just don't see Marxism as being "on the menu" in the U.S.

[NoOneIsIllegal]

I may have to check it out. However, being that it's a writer from The Nation, they may be more friendly towards people like Victor Berger and Morris Hillquit, social-democrats and aggressive sectarians, who helped derail socialism. I'm also hesitant of how they take the word in modern terms, considering people from The Nation and MSNBC tend to use terms like "European Socialism" (modern social democracy)

That's just a prediction, and hopefully it does a decent job for being a "mainstream" book.

[Manifesto]

I think I watch too much Boondocks because I had something different come to mind.

[graymouser]

It's on my shelf, and I read the introduction. It's about the "100% American" scene more than anything and from the Nation excerpt it seems to basically argue against Marxism. There's a very colorful American history that you can draw from, and I'm interested to read Nichols' history of it, but it's kind of on the back burner for fairly obvious reasons. He definitely turns more toward social democratic socialism, with a sort of faint glow for the utopians who flourished here more than elsewhere, but at the end of the day it's not what is going to get us there.

[Book O'Dead]

Has anyone picked up this book yet? I saw it at a bookstore today, and only got to read the back cover. It apparently deals with the American socialist tradition, and how they helped contribute to U.S. society. Only thing is, it is written by a The Nation correspondent, and I'm afraid it'll reek of reformism.

That said, it is at least refreshing to see a book with a positive account of socialism in a bookshelf full of idiotic teabagger bullshit about Obama's evil socialist plan to destroy America.

Is this the same John Nichols the novelist, the one that wrote "The Magic Journey", "The Milagro Beanfield War", "Nirvana Blues", Etc?

The Nichols I'm referring to is one of America's greatest living novelists and an avowed Marxist (He says so himself in the afterword of "Milagro").

BTW, I recommend to anyone with a taste for contemporary literature to read "The Magic Journey". It's a fictionalized account about the landgrabs that took place for half a century in New Mexico and the class struggle that ensued.

Nichols, in my opinion, is the only living American novelist of any stature that handles the subject of the class struggle with prescience and lucidity.

Look him up in Wikipedia under "John Nichols (novelist)".

[x359594]

Is this the same John Nichols the novelist, the one that wrote "The Magic Journey", "The Milagro Beanfield War", "Nirvana Blues", Etc?...

No, this John Nichols is a journalist who writes for The Nation and other left-liberal periodicals.