SocialistStories حكايات اشتراكية

Statistics on Freedom
by Roque Dalton

Freedom of the press for Salvadoran people
costs 20 centavos a day
counting only those who can read
and have more than 20 centavos left over
after eating barely enough to stay alive.

Freedom of the press for the big
industrial merchants and publicists
sells for thousands and change for a black and white page
and I don't know how much for a square inch
of text or illustration.

Freedom of the press
for Don Napoleon Viera Altamirano
and Dutriz and Pinto and the owners of El Mundo
is worth millions:

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Statistics on Freedom - Roque Dalton.pdf

This play (117pg) by Kenyan leftist writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o was written after the "flag independence" (Nkrumah's term) from Britain. Ngugi often mentions the Mau Mau, which was the violent, revolutionary anti-imperialist resistance group which forced the british to leave Kenya (during which the british committed countless atrocities, including the execution of Mau Mau leader Dedan Kimathi, and the mass imprisonment of "sympathizers" in concentration camps, as well as routine and wide use of torture).

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I Will Marry When I Want - Ngugi wa Thiong'o.pdf

This story (64pg) is a good portrayal of the day to day routine and struggle of one of the most neglected groups in society: the poor elderly. It also makes the point of how the state neglects it's citizens, even those citizens, like the Colonel, who worked in high positions in the service of this same state.

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No One Writes to the Colonel - Gabriel Garcia Marquez.pdf

I have been reading lately some of Gramsci’s pre-prison writings, and I must say that they are very interesting. I especially liked this essay (written by Antonio Gramsci at the age of 19/20 (i.e. in 1911) at his secondary school in Cagliari, Sardinia), and hope my children write secondary school essays as good as this! Anyway, please read comrades, it is a good introduction to Gramsci if you have not read him before, and if you have it is still very interesting to read:

Oppressed and Oppressors (1911)
By Antonio Gramsci

I cannot concentrate at this meeting…Invoices… 20,000… Interests… 17,000..late payments… I just can’t stop thinking about the rocky hill nearby… The rocky hill adjacent to the sea… What a view! I wish I was on the top of it right now… alone..with some food, grapes maybe? Nuts? Doesn’t matter.. I will take a great book and when I get tired, I’ll lay down and try to catch the clouds with my hands. No, what about a few friends and comrades? Yup! That’s it.. people eating, laughing and discussing things…. Add to that a jazz quartet..

This is a short poem by Turkish communist writer Nâzım Hikmet Ran:

A Sad State of Freedom

You waste the attention of your eyes,

the glittering labour of your hands,

and knead the dough enough for dozens of loaves

of which you'll taste not a morsel;

you are free to slave for others-

you are free to make the rich richer.

The moment you're born

they plant around you

mills that grind lies

lies to last you a lifetime.

You keep thinking in your great freedom

a finger on your temple