What do you think?
Rate this book
Ernest Bevin: Labour's Churchill
Statesman, pre-eminent leader and founder of the free world's then largest and most formidable trade union, Ernest Bevin was one of the most rousing figures of the twentieth century. Minister of Labour in the wartime coalition during the Second World War, he was Churchill's right-hand man, masterminding the home front while the war supremo commanded the battle front. Afterwards, he was Foreign Secretary at one of the most critical moments in international history, responsible for keeping Stalin and communism out of Western Europe, and for creating West Germany, NATO and the transatlantic alliance, all of which underpin European democracy and security to this day. An orphan farm boy from Bristol, Bevin's astonishing rise to fame and power is unmatched by any leader to this day. In this discerning and wide-ranging biography, Andrew Adonis examines how 'the working-class John Bull' grew to a position of such authority, and offers a critical reassessment of his life and influence. Finally exploring Bevin’s powerful legacy and lessons for our own age, Adonis restores this charismatic statesman to his rightful place among the pantheon of Britain's greatest political leaders.
Paperback
Published June 3, 2021
1 person is currently reading
2 people want to read
About the author
Adonis
182 books206 followersAdonis was born Ali Ahmed Said in the village of Al Qassabin in Syria, in 1930, to a family of farmers, the oldest of six children. At the age of nineteen, he adopted the name Adonis (also spelled Adunis), after the Greek god of fertility, with the hopes that the new name would result in newspaper publication of his poems.
Although his family could not afford to send Adonis to school, his father taught him to read poetry and the Qu'ran, and memorize poems while he worked in the fields. When he was fourteen, Adonis read a poem to the president of Syria who was visiting a nearby town. The impressed president offered to grant a request, to which the young Adonis responded that he wanted to attend school. The president quickly made arrangements for Adonis to attend a French-run high school, after which he studied philosophy at Damascus University.
In 1956, after a year-long imprisonment for political activities, Adonis fled Syria for Beirut, Lebanon. He joined a vibrant community of artists, writers, and exiles in Beirut, and co-founded and edited Sh'ir, and later Muwaqaf, both progressive journals of poetry and politics. He studied at St. Joseph University in Beirut and obtained his Doctorat d'Etat in 1973.
Considered one of the Arab world's greatest living poets, Adonis is the author of numerous collections, including Mihyar of Damascus (BOA Editions, 2008), A Time Between Ashes and Roses (Syracuse University Press, 2004); If Only the Sea Could Sleep (2003); The Pages of Day and Night (2001); Transformations of the Lover (1982); The Book of the Five Poems (1980); The Blood of Adonis (1971), winner of the Syria-Lebanon Award of the International Poetry Forum; Songs of Mihyar the Damascene (1961), Leaves in the Wind (1958), and First Poems (1957). He is also an essayist, an editor of anthologies, a theoretician of poetics, and the translator of several works from French into Arabic.
Over the course of his career, Adonis has fearlessly experimented with form and content, pioneering the prose poem in Arabic, and taking a influential, and sometimes controversial role in Arab modernism. In a 2002 interview in the New York Times, Adonis declared: '"There is no more culture in the Arab world. It's finished. Culturally speaking, we are a part of Western culture, but only as consumers, not as creators."
Adonis's awards and honors include the first ever International Nâzim Hikmet Poetry Award, the Syria-Lebanon Best Poet Award, and the Highest Award of the International Poem Biennial in Brussels. He was elected as Stephen Mallarme Academy Member in Paris in 1983. He has taught at the Lebanese University as a professor of Arabic literature, at Damascus University, and at the Sorbonne. He has been a Lebanese citizen since 1961 and currently lives in Paris.
- See more at: http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/...
Although his family could not afford to send Adonis to school, his father taught him to read poetry and the Qu'ran, and memorize poems while he worked in the fields. When he was fourteen, Adonis read a poem to the president of Syria who was visiting a nearby town. The impressed president offered to grant a request, to which the young Adonis responded that he wanted to attend school. The president quickly made arrangements for Adonis to attend a French-run high school, after which he studied philosophy at Damascus University.
In 1956, after a year-long imprisonment for political activities, Adonis fled Syria for Beirut, Lebanon. He joined a vibrant community of artists, writers, and exiles in Beirut, and co-founded and edited Sh'ir, and later Muwaqaf, both progressive journals of poetry and politics. He studied at St. Joseph University in Beirut and obtained his Doctorat d'Etat in 1973.
Considered one of the Arab world's greatest living poets, Adonis is the author of numerous collections, including Mihyar of Damascus (BOA Editions, 2008), A Time Between Ashes and Roses (Syracuse University Press, 2004); If Only the Sea Could Sleep (2003); The Pages of Day and Night (2001); Transformations of the Lover (1982); The Book of the Five Poems (1980); The Blood of Adonis (1971), winner of the Syria-Lebanon Award of the International Poetry Forum; Songs of Mihyar the Damascene (1961), Leaves in the Wind (1958), and First Poems (1957). He is also an essayist, an editor of anthologies, a theoretician of poetics, and the translator of several works from French into Arabic.
Over the course of his career, Adonis has fearlessly experimented with form and content, pioneering the prose poem in Arabic, and taking a influential, and sometimes controversial role in Arab modernism. In a 2002 interview in the New York Times, Adonis declared: '"There is no more culture in the Arab world. It's finished. Culturally speaking, we are a part of Western culture, but only as consumers, not as creators."
Adonis's awards and honors include the first ever International Nâzim Hikmet Poetry Award, the Syria-Lebanon Best Poet Award, and the Highest Award of the International Poem Biennial in Brussels. He was elected as Stephen Mallarme Academy Member in Paris in 1983. He has taught at the Lebanese University as a professor of Arabic literature, at Damascus University, and at the Sorbonne. He has been a Lebanese citizen since 1961 and currently lives in Paris.
- See more at: http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/...
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 17, 2025
Interesting examination of the role Ernest Bevin played in the trade union movement, the Labour Party and the UK government to his death in 1951. This is not a traditional biography (the author makes reference to other works which fulfil that purpose), it looks at his achievements and the impact they had in a particularly volatile period of history.
The book is particularly strong on Bevin’s role during wartime and as Foreign Secretary in the post-war Attlee government. His interactions with Stalin and Molotov and their US counterparts are neatly analysed and the author draws wider conclusions from the events to show how they impacted the 20th century. Andrew Adonis (himself a former Labour politician and now a member of the House of Lords) is definitely an admirer of Bevin’s acumen, pragmatism and integrity, but he does not shy away from the other side of the coin and examines how Bevin’s imperialist beliefs led him later to errors of judgment in the Middle East and other parts of the post-colonial world.
I found this a readable and useful background on Bevin’s achievements and it gave a good sense of his strengths and weaknesses. It also makes the reader long for the days when politicians could put some, if not all, of their personal interests and prejudices aside to work together for the good of the country. Adonis says we could do with an Ernest Bevin nowadays, and looking at our current political situation I cannot disagree.
The book is particularly strong on Bevin’s role during wartime and as Foreign Secretary in the post-war Attlee government. His interactions with Stalin and Molotov and their US counterparts are neatly analysed and the author draws wider conclusions from the events to show how they impacted the 20th century. Andrew Adonis (himself a former Labour politician and now a member of the House of Lords) is definitely an admirer of Bevin’s acumen, pragmatism and integrity, but he does not shy away from the other side of the coin and examines how Bevin’s imperialist beliefs led him later to errors of judgment in the Middle East and other parts of the post-colonial world.
I found this a readable and useful background on Bevin’s achievements and it gave a good sense of his strengths and weaknesses. It also makes the reader long for the days when politicians could put some, if not all, of their personal interests and prejudices aside to work together for the good of the country. Adonis says we could do with an Ernest Bevin nowadays, and looking at our current political situation I cannot disagree.
September 7, 2023
A very interesting read, how is that Ernest Bevin’s name is not more well known? Clearly his leadership was a great benefit to the UK, Germany and the Labour Party. I found it a bit difficult at times to engage with Lord Adonis’ writing style though with it not being strictly chronological and I think at times some assumed knowledge.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews