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The socialist activist E. T. Kingsley occupies an odd place in the
history of labor and the left. Often mentioned due to his prolific
life of speaking, writing, traveling and organizing, he has still
generally remained wrapped in obscurity, leaving little in the way of
a paper trail for us to understand who he actually is. Fortunately,
Benjamin Isitt and Ravi Malhotra have been working to correct this.
Following up their coauthored biography of him, they have now put out an anthology of writings and
speeches of Kingsley from the late 19th and early 20th
century: Class Warrior: The Selected Works of E. T. Kingsley (Athabasca UP, 2022).
While the entries tend to be short, their polemical nature and reflection on current events open up a window to the labor struggles of the Pacific Northwest a century ago, allowing us to see a new angle on, and perhaps develop a new appreciation of our history.
Ravi Malhotra is a professor in the faculty of law at the University of Ottawa.
Benjamin Isitt is a historian, author, and legal scholar in British Columbia.