By either of these methods, freedom can be preserved
for the artist in a socialistic commonwealth--
far more complete freedom, and far more widespread,
than any that now exists except for the possessors of
capital.
But there still remain some not altogether easy
problems. Take, for example, the publishing of books.
There will not, under Socialism, be private publishers
as at present: under State Socialism, presumably the
State will be the sole publisher, while under Syndicalism
or Guild Socialism the Federation du Livre
will have the whole of the trade in its hands. Under
these circumstances, who is to decide what MSS. are
to be printed? It is clear that opportunities exist
for an Index more rigorous than that of the Inquisition.
If the State were the sole publisher, it would
doubtless refuse books opposed to State Socialism.
If the Federation du Livre were the ultimate arbiter,
what publicity could be obtained for works criticising
it? And apart from such political difficulties
we should have, as regards literature, that
very censorship by eminent officials which we agreed
to regard as disastrous when we were considering the
fine arts in general. The difficulty is serious, and a
way of meeting it must be found if literature is to
remain free.
Kropotkin, who believes that manual and intellectual
work should be combined, holds that authors
themselves should be compositors, bookbinders, etc.
He even seems to suggest that the whole of the manual
work involved in producing books should be done by
authors. It may be doubted whether there are
enough authors in the world for this to be possible,
and in any case I cannot but think that it would
be a waste of time for them to leave the work they
understand in order to do badly work which others
could do far better and more quickly. That, however,
does not touch our present point, which is the
question how the MSS. to be printed will be selected.
In Kropotkin's plan there will presumably be an
Author's Guild, with a Committee of Management,
if Anarchism allows such things. This Committee
of Management will decide which of the books submitted
to it are worthy to be printed. Among these
will be included those by the Committee and their
friends, but not those by their enemies. Authors
of rejected MSS. will hardly have the patience to
spend their time setting up the works of successful
rivals, and there will have to be an elaborate system
of log-rolling if any books are to be printed at all.
It hardly looks as if this plan would conduce to harmony
among literary men, or would lead to the publication
of any book of an unconventional tendency.
Kropotkin's own books, for example, would hardly
have found favor.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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