Reflections, Sketches, and Provocations: Essays and Commentary, 1981-1987

by Bob Avakian

What do you say about a leader of a revolutionary party who can analyze the style of play and attitude of one of the teams in an NCAA basketball championship game in order to draw lessons about revolution? And what do you say about a self-described communist and Marxist-Leninist-Maoist who can address some fundamental questions to Carl Sagan and Stephen Jay Gould concerning the character of intellectual inquiry and debate in socialist society, while at teh same time he can decry the ossification of Marxism into a state religion? Well, you can say his name is Bob Avakian and that he is one of the most original and provocative thinkers of our time. Reflections, Sketches and Profocations is a collection of articles and messages written over a period of seven years, a kind of political compass of the 1980s. Consistently fresh and vibrant in his perceptions, Avakian can look at a movie like Fort Apache, The Bronx and launch into a discussion of liberalism; or take the opening lines of a speech by Ronald Reagan and tear apart its historica, even its geological, assumptions; or contrast two very different kinds of "festivals" occurring simultaneously in the Orange Bowl hoopla and a rebellion in the Black community. Yet as broad-ranging as these writings are, certain basic themes run through the obscene hypocrisy of the imperialists, the limits of reformism, the shifts in the world since the 1960s and the strategic weakness of imperialism, the need to oppose war with revolution, and the nature and necessity of revolutionary preparation. And if Avakian is passionately concerned with the revolutionary seizure of power, he is no less absorbed with the difficulties of exercising that power and of advancing to communist society where there would be no class distinctions and no state - no power exercised by one part of society over another. From a piece that extends no more than a paragraph to an expansive essay, Avakian has that rare ability to not only offer up insights but to force his reader to argue with him. For those unacquainted with the work of Bob Avakian, this collection will serve as a splendid introduction. For those who have encountered him before, here brought under once cover of some of his most engaging writings.

Hardcover

About the author

"If you don't have a poetic spirit-or at least a poetic side- it is very dangerous for you to lead a Marxist movement or be the leader of a socialist state. "
- Bob Avakian

Bob Avakian (BA) is the architect of a whole new framework of human emancipation, the new synthesis of communism, which is popularly referred to as the "new communism. " The goal of the new communism is a total revolution - the most radical revolution in human history that aims at nothing less than overcoming all forms of oppression and exploitation all over the world, a society where humanity could truly flourish. The new synthesis is based on more than 40 years of revolutionary work that BA has done critically analyzing and drawing from past revo­lutionary experience and theory, and a broad range of human activity and thought. It is a continuation of, but also represents a qualitative leap beyond, and in some important ways a break with, communist theory as it had been previously developed. It provides the basis--the science, the strategy, and the leadership--for an actual revolution and a radically new society on the road to real emancipation.

Bob Avakian is the Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA (RCP), which he has led since its formation in 1975. He emerged as a major political figure throughout the upheavals and rebellions of the period of the '60s: awakening to political life in the period of the emerging discontent and ferment among students in the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley; joining and then becoming a leader of the resistance and protests against the Vietnam War; becoming an early and prominent supporter of the Black Liberation struggle where he was closely associated with the Black Panther Party; then playing a critical leading role in the political and ideological struggles of the New Left Movement of the 1960s, which ultimately led to the founding of the RCP. In the decades since the 1960s BA has given decisive leadership to the theoretical as well as strategic and practical dimensions of the revolution, both in the U.S. and internationally.

BA’s extensive body of work includes more than a hundred articles, books, films and audio recordings.  His collected works are available through The Bob Avakian Institute, http://thebobavakianinstitute.org.

The above is excerpted from “Bob Avakian (BA)–Official Biography,” a publication of The Bob Avakian Institute.