Lou P cited Richard Vinen in the TLS: 'He [Orwell] was not much interested in Marxist theory and his remark, apropos of TS Eliot, that Anglo-Catholicism was the "ecclesiastical equivalent of Trotskyism", was probably designed to annoy Trotskyites as much as Anglo-Catholics.'
The reference to Anglo-Catholicism was also related to the fact that one of the leading members of the first Trotskyist group in Britain, the Balham Group, was a lifelong Anglo-Catholic and a protégé of the left-wing Anglo-Catholic minister Conrad Noel. Orwell personally knew Groves, and would have been aware of his religious views. Anglo-Catholicism is a wing of the Church of England, and are often called the 'smells and bells' wing because of their allegiance to many traditional practices. Groves' religious views were a bit of an embarrassment to many Trotskyists in Britain, although I imagine that the contrast between the staunchly atheist Trotsky and the devout Groves would have amused Orwell. The subject was not mentioned in Al Richardson and Sam Bornstein's history of the movement, Two Steps Back (they also didn't mention the weapons cache that the Revolutionary Communist Party had at the end of the Second World War, but that's another story). I asked Professor Robert Service, who has just completed a new biography of Trotsky, whether Groves' religious views were known by Trotsky, but he told me that he didn't see anything in the archives on the topic. I doubt if many list members are aware that the Stalin-Trotsky debate was fought out in the Church of England, with supporters of Trotsky and Stalin battling it out in the radical Christian press. My pal Ron Heisler has just completed an account of this for a future issue of Revolutionary History; and he gave me a copy of a truly bizarre article that defends the Moscow Trials on the basis of Christian theology. Did anything like this occur in other countries? Paul F ________________________________________________ YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. Send list submissions to: [email protected] Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
