DSW

It's a bit like when you discover that some Labour MPs are still claiming that Robert Tressell's 'Ragged Trousered Philanthropists' is the book that most inspired them to become socialists and, erm, join the Labour Party, so I was a wee bit surprised to discover that Chris Brooke's excellent Dead Socialist Watch - an ongoing series on his blog where on any given day he will list which 'socialist' died on the day in question - has been neatly boxed up with a red ribbon and bow at the Bloggers4Labour site, and can now be viewed in its entirety on the following linked page.

Of course one person's socialist is another person's "labor fakir", and it can be a bit galling to think some of the names listed could ever possibly be associated with the label 'socialist' but I guess in the same spirit that keeps the Leftist Trainspotters List ticking over without too much internecine strife, there has to be an element of ecumenity when compiling such lists.

Intrigued to discover that Stuart Adamson merits a mention, but there is no listing for Phil Ochs who died on April 9th 1973, and I didn't know that Prokofiev and Stalin died on the same day: March 5th 1953. I wonder if it's a bookend of sorts that those two most playful of radicals, Oscar Wilde and Guy Debord, both died on November 30th at opposite ends of the twentieth century and I'm always saddened when I rediscover that David Widgery and Eleanor Marx both died so prematurely.