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Christopher Caudwell

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Christopher Caudwell

Christopher Caudwell is the pseudonym of Christopher St. John Sprigg (20 October 1907 – 12 February 1937), a British Marxist writer, thinker and poet.

He was born into a Catholic family living at 53 Montserrat Road, Putney, in Southwest London. He was educated at the Benedictine Ealing Priory School, but left school at the age of 15 after his father, Stanhope Sprigg, lost his job as literary editor of the Daily Express. Caudwell moved with his father to Bradford and began work as a reporter for the Yorkshire Observer.

Caudwell found his own way to Marxism and set about rethinking everything in light of it, from poetry to philosophy to physics. He joined the Communist Party of Great Britain in Poplar in the East End of London.

In December 1936 he drove an ambulance to Spain and joined the International Brigades there, training as a machine-gunner at Albacete before becoming a machine-gun instructor and group political delegate. He also edited a wall newspaper. He was killed in action on 12 February 1937, the first day of the Battle of the Jarama Valley. His brother, Theodore, had attempted to have Caudwell recalled by the Communist Party of Great Britain by showing its General Secretary, Harry Pollitt, the proofs of Caudwell's book Illusion and Reality. However, despite the myth that a recall telegram was sent but arrived after Caudwell's death, no telegram or other recall instruction was ever sent, which was an enduring source of bitterness for Theodore.

Caudwell's Marxist works were published posthumously. The first was Illusion and Reality (1937), an analysis of poetry.

Contents

Works

Caudwell published widely, writing criticism, poetry, short stories and novels. Much of his work was published posthumously.

Criticism

  • Illusion and Reality (1937)
  • Studies in a Dying Culture (1938)
  • The Crisis in Physics (1939)
  • Further Studies in a Dying Culture (1949)
  • Romance and Realism (1970)
  • Scenes and Actions (1986)

Poetry

  • Poems (1939)
  • Collected Poems (1986)

Short stories

  • Scenes and Actions (1986)
  • Death at 8:30

Novels

  • The Kingdom of Heaven (1929)

Other

  • The Airship: Its Design, History, Operation and Future (1931)
  • British Airways (1934)

External links