The life and work of the self-employed socialist intellectual, Humphrey McQueen

(essay)

There is a tradition in academia of dedicating to veteran or retiring scholars a "feschrift", which is usually a collection of essays by other scholars about the scholar's chosen field and their contribution to it. Humphrey McQueen has done his prolific and wide-ranging intellectual work mainly outside academe, and is a self-employed freelance historian and journalist, so he has no institution to give him a feschrift, but some of his writing is available on the web, so Ozleft has put together a list of this material as a kind of virtual feschrift. This is not to suggest that Humphrey may be about to retire, as he shows no sign of running out of intellectual steam and he has no great pot of superannuation to live on in any case. In fact, circumstances have made him into John Howard and Peter Costello's ideal citizen: he is forced both by economic necessity and by the passionate nature of his intellectual activity to work on past the standard retiring age — although the serious products of his work are not likely to please Howard and Costello at all.

I have a lot of sympathy for Humphrey in this respect. He is a little younger than me, about 60, and at the age of 66, I am in pretty much the same boat myself. The cynical thing about the insulting rhetoric of Howard and Costello on these matters is that their appeal to people in the age group of Humphrey and myself to work on is clearly linked to their intention to cut the pension and associated social benefits. We should fight that intention of the Tories with every piece of resourcefulness we can muster. The right to the pension and associated social benefits was won in struggle, and we should defend it.

Humphrey McQueen's life

Humphrey McQueen was born in Brisbane, into a Catholic working-class family that was active in the Labor Party. I first met him in the very early 1960s. He sent a copy of the Queensland Young Labor newsletter, which he edited, in which he reprinted several articles from Trotskyist journals, to a Sydney Trotskyist magazine with which I was associated. I was deputed by my colleagues to go to Brisbane and attend a Queensland Young Labor conference on the Sunshine Coast, and meet this young prodigy. This was quite a conference. Humphrey had invited a spectrum of socialist academics and personalities such as Bruce McFarlane, myself and others, to speak at this event, which mildly displeased the rather uncomprehending bureaucrats of the Old Guard, who at that time ran the Queensland ALP.

McQueen, even at the age of 18, was confident and articulate, and he was possibly the tallest youth I had ever encountered. We never did succeed in roping him into the political orbit of our Sydney Trotskyist group. He went, a year or so later, to Canberra and Melbourne to study, where he made the intellectual shift to Maoism and was caught up in the intense agitational activity and enthusiasm of the Maoist movement.

Bibliography

A N e w Br i t a nn ia: A n A rgum e nt C o nc e rn i ng th e S o c ia l O r i g i ns o f A ustr a l ia n N a t io n a l i sm a nd S o c ia l i sm, Pelican Books, Melbourne, 1970

A b o r i g i n e s , R a c e a nd R a c i sm, Penguin Books, Melbourne, 1974

S o c ia l Sk e tch e s o f A ustr a l ia, 1888-1975, Harmondsworth Penguin, 1978

Th e Bl a ck Sw a n o f Tr e sp a ss : Th e E m e rg e nc e o f M o d e rn i st P ai nt i ng i n A ustr a l ia t o 1944, Alternative Publishing Co-operative, Sydney, 1979

Th e A rt o f M a rg a r e t Pr e st o n, Art Gallery Board of South Australia, Adelaide, 1980 (with Ian North and Isobel Seivl)

A ustr a l ia' s M e d ia M o n o p o l ie s, Visa, Melbourne, 1981

G o n e T o m o rr o w : A ustr a l ia i n th e 1980 s, Angus and Robertson, Sydney, 1982

G a ll i p o l i t o P e tr o v : A rgu i ng W i th A ustr a l ia n H i st o ry, Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 1984

Suburbs o f th e S a cr e d : Tr a nsf o rm i ng A ustr a l ia n B e l ie fs a nd V a lu e s, Penguin, Melbourne, 1988

J a p a n t o th e R e scu e: A ustr a l ia n S e cur i ty A r o und th e I nd o n e s ia n A rch i p e l a g o dur i ng th e A m e r i c a n C e ntury, Heinemann, Port Melbourne, 1991

T o ky o W o rld : A n A ustr a l ia n D ia ry, William Heinemann, Melbourne, 1991

T o m R o b e rts, Macmillan, Sydney, 1996

Susp e ct H i st o ry : M a nn i ng Cl a rk a nd th e Futur e o f A ustr a l ia' s P a st, Wakefield Press, Adelaide, 1997

T e mp e r D e m o cr a t i c : H o w E xc e pt io n a l i s A ustr a l ia? Wakefield Press, Adelaide, 1998

Th e E ss e nc e o f C a p i t a l i sm : Th e O r i g i ns o f O ur Futur e, Sceptre/Hodder Headline

The life and work of the self-employed socialist intellectual, Humphrey McQueen

(essay)

There is a tradition in academia of dedicating to veteran or retiring scholars a "feschrift", which is usually a collection of essays by other scholars about the scholar's chosen field and their contribution to it. Humphrey McQueen has done his prolific and wide-ranging intellectual work mainly outside academe, and is a self-employed freelance historian and journalist, so he has no institution to give him a feschrift, but some of his writing is available on the web, so Ozleft has put together a list of this material as a kind of virtual feschrift. This is not to suggest that Humphrey may be about to retire, as he shows no sign of running out of intellectual steam and he has no great pot of superannuation to live on in any case. In fact, circumstances have made him into John Howard and Peter Costello's ideal citizen: he is forced both by economic necessity and by the passionate nature of his intellectual activity to work on past the standard retiring age — although the serious products of his work are not likely to please Howard and Costello at all.

I have a lot of sympathy for Humphrey in this respect. He is a little younger than me, about 60, and at the age of 66, I am in pretty much the same boat myself. The cynical thing about the insulting rhetoric of Howard and Costello on these matters is that their appeal to people in the age group of Humphrey and myself to work on is clearly linked to their intention to cut the pension and associated social benefits. We should fight that intention of the Tories with every piece of resourcefulness we can muster. The right to the pension and associated social benefits was won in struggle, and we should defend it.

Humphrey McQueen's life

Humphrey McQueen was born in Brisbane, into a Catholic working-class family that was active in the Labor Party. I first met him in the very early 1960s. He sent a copy of the Queensland Young Labor newsletter, which he edited, in which he reprinted several articles from Trotskyist journals, to a Sydney Trotskyist magazine with which I was associated. I was deputed by my colleagues to go to Brisbane and attend a Queensland Young Labor conference on the Sunshine Coast, and meet this young prodigy. This was quite a conference. Humphrey had invited a spectrum of socialist academics and personalities such as Bruce McFarlane, myself and others, to speak at this event, which mildly displeased the rather uncomprehending bureaucrats of the Old Guard, who at that time ran the Queensland ALP.

McQueen, even at the age of 18, was confident and articulate, and he was possibly the tallest youth I had ever encountered. We never did succeed in roping him into the political orbit of our Sydney Trotskyist group. He went, a year or so later, to Canberra and Melbourne to study, where he made the intellectual shift to Maoism and was caught up in the intense agitational activity and enthusiasm of the Maoist movement.