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Back to topMML BOOK SALE
Book sale of second hand books and pamphlets. Including rare books, Marxist classics, trade union and labour movement history and much more!
11am to 3pm
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
ONSITE EVENT: Open House Open Day
Explore our historic building - including Lenin's office and our 1935 fresco. The Library will be open from 11.00am to 3.00pm.
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
Check out our listing on the Open House programme here https://programme.openhouse.org.uk/listings/1048
ONLINE TASTER SESSION: Introducing Marx & Marxism
This short session is for anyone who’s ever wanted to know a bit more about Marxism. It includes a short introduction from a tutor at the Marx Memorial Library and then is an opportunity to ask questions and discuss more.
At the end, maybe you’ll want to do more. If so, there are lots more courses run by the Marx Memorial Library’s Workers’ School where you can go into greater depth and learn about this phenomenon.
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
REGISTER HERE
ONSITE & ONLINE LECTURE: Can AI Save Capitalism?
The Marx Memorial Library & Workers' School's annual Political Economy Lecture with Michael Roberts
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
“AI is perhaps the most significant change in our economy in my adult lifetime. AI will be a significant disinflationary force, increasing productivity and bolstering American competitiveness.” - Chair of the Federal Reserve, Kevin Warsh.
AI investment is exploding and driving economic expansion, particularly in the US. Huge amounts of credit, stock market funds and circular financing are funding this boom.
As yet, no profits are being made; and any productivity boost has been marginal. So a financial bust looks inevitable.
But there still could be a technological revolution after that, but likely spread over up to 20 years before real effects are felt.
AI will only save capitalism if labour is hugely replaced so that profitability for capital rises. Will that happen? The jury is out.
AI will not replace human intelligence and social labour; and it will only benefit humankind if based on common ownership and planning: reducing hours of toil and with labour reaping the benefits of increased productivity rather than profits for capital.
ONSITE & ONLINE PANEL: The Spanish Civil War 90 Years on: Legacies and Lessons
This panel - jointly organised by the Marx Memorial Library & Workers' School and the International Brigade Memorial Trust - explores lessons for today on solidarity, internationalism and anti-fascism with three guest speakers
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
Ninety years on from the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War and the formation of the International Brigades, the MML and IBMT convene this panel to consider what the experience of Spain can teach the labour movement today.
The MML is home to the Spanish Collection, the most significant archive in the UK documenting the British response to the Spanish Civil War. The IBMT is dedicated to keeping alive the memory and legacy of the International Brigaders from Britain and Ireland.
The panel will feature:
- Alex Gordon, General Secretary, Communist Party
- Noelia Sanchez, Chair, PCE-GB
- Micaela Tracey-Ramos, UNISON Vice-President
There will also be an opportunity to view selected items from the MML’s Spanish Collection in the Reading Room.
ONLINE CLASS INTRODUCING MARXIST CLASSICS
Engels: The Origin of Family, Private Property and the State with Professor Mary Davis
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
Engels’ foundational text argues that the family, private property & state are not determined by our genes, or ordained by God, but arose alongside the development of class society.
This series of classes introduces you to a classic text in Marxism. In each class, an MML tutor will introduce you to a classic of Marxism, explaining why it was written, what its effect was on its readers, at the time and later, and examining its lasting relevance today. If you’ve ever wanted to have a brief introduction to help get you on your way with a classic of Marxism, this is the place to start.
The classes are run on zoom, and you can sign up for one or all the sessions. We’ll send you a resource sheet in advance and you can submit your questions to be discussed with tutors.
ONLINE CLASS INTRODUCING MARXIST CLASSICS
Engels: The Housing Question with Professor Marj Mayo and Professor Linda Clarke
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
The principal features of today’s ‘housing crisis’ were identified by Engels over a century and a half ago, as were the emptiness of the ‘solutions’ proposed. Permanent solutions require a change in the social order.
This series of classes introduces you to a classic text in Marxism. In each class, an MML tutor will introduce you to a classic of Marxism, explaining why it was written, what its effect was on its readers, at the time and later, and examining its lasting relevance today. If you’ve ever wanted to have a brief introduction to help get you on your way with a classic of Marxism, this is the place to start.
The classes are run on zoom, and you can sign up for one or all the sessions. We’ll send you a resource sheet in advance and you can submit your questions to be discussed with tutors.
ONLINE CLASS INTRODUCING MARXIST CLASSICS
Lenin: Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism with Nina Hilton
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
Have you ever wondered about the connections between economics and colonial expansion, or how the relentless drive for accumulation by capital crossed national borders and led to global imperialism? Join us to learn about Lenin's analysis of this very topic, published (almost) 100 years ago, but just as insightful and relevant today.
This series of classes introduces you to a classic text in Marxism. In each class, an MML tutor will introduce you to a classic of Marxism, explaining why it was written, what its effect was on its readers, at the time and later, and examining its lasting relevance today. If you’ve ever wanted to have a brief introduction to help get you on your way with a classic of Marxism, this is the place to start.
The classes are run on zoom, and you can sign up for one or all the sessions. We’ll send you a resource sheet in advance and you can submit your questions to be discussed with tutors.
ONSITE EVENT: REDS ON THE GREEN: Lenin in Clerkenwell
Joint with Islington Heritage. Free; All welcome
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
Join us to explore Lenin’s time in Clerkenwell and his connections with 37a Clerkenwell Green (today’s Marx Memorial Library & Workers’ School) and the local area.
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870–1924) was a Russian revolutionary and political thinker, a leading figure of the Russian Revolution and founder of the Soviet Union.
Alex Gordon - a Trustee of the Marx Memorial Library & Workers' School - will discuss Lenin’s ties to Marx House and the wider area, while actor Maxine Peake will read from the memoirs of Nadezhda Krupskaya, Lenin’s comrade and wife, bringing to life the experiences and everyday life of the revolutionary couple in London.
The session will also offer a chance to visit the historic Lenin Room at Marx Memorial Library where Lenin worked during his time in London in 1902–03 and to view some of MML's unique collection.
This is a unique opportunity to explore Clerkenwell’s radical history and discover the places, people and ideas that shaped Lenin’s years in London and changed the world.
ONSITE & ONLINE ENGELS MEMORIAL LECTURE
Professor Chik Collins delivers the annual Engels Memorial Lecture, organised jointly with the Working Class Movement Library
Email: info@marx-memorial-library.org.uk
For this year’s Engels Lecture, we return to the question of language as a contested tool in struggles for social and political change. Beginning with Engels’ The Part Played by Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man, the lecture traces ideas about language through the early Soviet theorists Volosinov and Vygotsky, while drawing on concrete struggles from which we can learn. It also makes the case for renewed critical attention to language, both in theory and in practice.
We are delighted to welcome Professor Collins to deliver this year’s lecture. Professor Collins was a member of staff at the University of the West of Scotland (UWS) and its predecessor institution, the University of Paisley, between 1993 and 2019. He completed his PhD under the supervision of John Foster and Charles Woolfson in 1997, which was published as Language, Ideology and Social Consciousness: Developing a Sociohistorical Approach (Ashgate, 1999; Routledge, 2019).
Professor Collins became Professor of Applied Social Science at UWS before becoming Rector/Vice Chancellor of the University of the Faroe Islands in 2019. He returned to Scotland in 2023 and became Director of the Glasgow Centre for Population in 2025.
His publications have addressed language and social change, urban and regional policy, community development, and population health and health inequalities, with a particular focus on the political economy of modern Scotland.
Now retired from full-time employment, Professor Collins returns to the question of language for this year’s Engels Lecture, exploring its role in shaping social and political change.