Feminism & Anarchy

Do the two above social philosophies go together? For me they do, as I recall that when I first discovered feminism, I also was a member of TREASON, the Anarchist Club at Melbourne University in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Consequently I collected books on these subjects as below.

Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch was for me probably the most influential of the various feminist texts published in the 1970s. It was a book that everyone read at the time, both men and women. I also remember being impressed by Ingrid Bengis’ Combat in the Erogenous Zone.

Then there is The Dialectic of Sex by the wonderfully named Shulamith Firestone.

Emma Goldman actually provides the link between Feminism and Anarchism. I did have both volumes of her biography, but Volume One has gone astray.

A couple of other books on Anarchism…

Next – more New Age type stuff.

Penguin Books – Pelicans – Politics, Sociology & Psychiatry

Pelicans are of course the non fiction imprint of Penguin. They encompass a wide variety of topics, from politics, to art, to sociology, to history and literature.

I have a smallish collection of Pelicans quite probably mostly acquired through the auspices of my friend who worked for Penguin.

Politics and Revolutionaries

Sociology & Psychiatry

Next - more Pelicans

Pelicans – History, Literature & Art

Finally – three Australian Pelicans

Next – general non fiction

Black Classics – A Miscellany

This will be the final entry on the Penguin “Black Classics”. There may be a few more floating around in my book collection, but the bulk of them have now been displayed.

First – Chinese & Japanese Literature

1963 Edition A detail of a Chinese silk painting of 8th to 10th C with the young Buddha practising archery	1972 Edition Detail from Ch’ing Ming Shang Ho Tu the famous scroll depicting a city of Cathay. Attributed to Chiang Tse-tuan

1973 Edition – detail of the Shotoku Taishi E-den by Munezane (Heian period)

Spanish & Portuguese Literature

1963 Edition A Zapotec figure from Monte Alban	1964 Edition A detail of a Spanish manuscript

1973 Edition
A Portuguese Caravelle rounding the Cape of Good Hope from the Atlas of Guillaume le Testu 1556.

Pirates

1969 Edition
Detail from “Battle at Sea” by Jan Peeters

Nietzche & Machiavelli

1971 Edition Detail from an etching of Nietzche by Hans Old	1964 Edition A bust of Machiavelli

I will be moving on to Pelicans in the next entry.

Black Classics – Old English, Old Norse and Mediaeval Literature

When I attended the University of Melbourne in the 1960s I enrolled in a course of Middle English. The lecturer for this course was a delightful old scholar called Professor Ian Maxwell who also ran a course in Old Icelandic and hosted a discussion group for enthusiasts of Old Norse. In the Middle English course we had to read books like The Canterbury Tales and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in the original. Although I only studied Middle English for one year, I did develop an interest in early English literature, hence these books in my Black Classics collection. Needless to say, they have been gathering dust for many years.

1964 Edition Detail from Medieval Illuminated Manuscript	1966 Edition Detail of the Franks Casket
1969 Edition Detail from L’Apparition du St Graal in a 15thC manuscript	1973 Edition King Arthur – a detail from a French manuscript

Two editions of Beowulf…

1963 Edition A prose translation by David Wright Cover – a helmet from Sutton Hoo treasure	1973 Edition A verse translation by Michael Alexander Cover – detail of enlarged escutcheon on the rim of the large hanging bowl from Sutton Hoo

1963 Edition
Detail from a 14thC manuscript of the Conquest of Constantinople

1981 Edition The Voyage of St Brendan, Bede’s Life of St Cuthbert & Eddius’s Life of Wilfrid Cover – Athelstan presenting the Book to St Cuthbert from Bede	1971 Edition Detail of an illumination from the Book of Durrow

Norse Sagas

1966 Edition Detail from Baldishot Tapestry	1965 Edition Axehead from the grave of a Viking chief

Medieval German Literature

1965 Edition Detail from the Hundeshagen Codex, the only surviving Nibelung manuscript with illustrations	1965 Edition Also contains The Tristan of Thomas Detail of a woodcut in an early edition of Tristan

Next – the last of the Black Classics – a miscellany