William Morris on Socialism
Uncollected Essays
William Morris
Edited by Florence Boos
- Gathers a selection of Morris's essays from manuscripts, newspapers and long out-of-print sources
- Follows Morris’s development from a youthful art reformer and anti-imperialist through his years as a skilled political theorist and widely influential pan-socialist presence
- Adds to our understanding of Morris’s views on competition, war, violence, social justice and the need to protect our natural environment
William Morris’s socialist essays remain uncannily relevant for our time, as he addresses issues of inequality, precarity, and the need for pleasure and creative fulfilment in work and life. This scholarly edition traces Morris’s opinions from his early insistence that all must have access to art in its broadest sense, through his years as a leader and theorist of the nascent British socialist movement. Finally, as Morris became the elder statesman of the socialist/labour cause, these writings demonstrate his efforts to reconcile competing factions in the service of common aims.
List of FiguresList of AbbreviationsAcknowledgementsSeries Preface
Introduction: William Morris’s Uncollected Political Essays: Equality, Non-Violence, and "One Socialist Party"
Part I: From Liberalism to Socialism, 1878–18811. Early Political Essay, Untitled, ["Against War with Russia"], 18782. Address at the Cambridge School of Art Prizegiving ["Art for All"], February 21, 18783. "Our Country Right or Wrong," January 18804. A Lecture Delivered to the Men’s and Women’s College ["Art and Inequality"], 1880
Part II: Socialism: The Middle Phase, 1883–18895. "An Invitation to Join the Democratic Federation," 18836. "The Relations of Art to Labour," April 1884, 1890 7. Address at the Opening of the Fourth Annual Loan Exhibition, Whitechapel, April 1884 8. "Misery and the Way Out," September 18849. "Introduction to A Review of European Society by John Sketchley," September 29, 188410. "Commercial War," 188511. "Socialism," 1885 12. "The Political Outlook," 1886 13. "Equality," 1888 14. "How Shall We Live Then," March 1889 15. Address on English Socialism on Behalf of the Socialist League: Report to the First Congress of the Second International, Paris, July 1889
Part III: A Final Phase: Some Tempered Warnings, 1891–96Non-Violent Revolution 1891–94 16. "Socialism Up to Date," 1891 17. "Communism—i. e. Property," 1892 18. "Town and Country," 1893 19. "How I Became a Socialist," June 1894 20. "Why I Am a Communist," 1894
Valedictory 1895–189621. "What We Have to Look For," 1895 22. "Change of Position – Not Change of Condition," 1895 23. ["One Socialist Party"], 1896 24. "Against the Abuses of Public Advertising," January 1896 25. "The Present Outlook of Socialism in England," April 1896 26. "The Promise of May," published in Justice, May 1896
Appendix: List of Morris’s Anthologized Essays
Index
William Morris, the best known British socialist of the nineteenth century, is also the most widely appealing. Marxist revolutionaries, Fabians, anarchists, Labour Party stalwarts—all have claimed him as one of their own. Florence Boos’s collection of Morris’s political essays confirms that Morris contained multitudes. Yet powerful, unchanging beliefs link the Gladstonian liberal of the 1870s with the visionary author of News from Nowhere. Boos’s deeply informed introductions to every essay draw out their underlying themes and illuminate Morris’s enduring relevance.
