A. L. Morton

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This article is about the historian. For the racewalker, see Les Morton.

A. L. Morton
Born
Arthur Leslie Morton

(1903-07-04)4 July 1903
Cambridge University
Occupation(s)Journalist for the Daily Worker.
Bookseller.
Teacher at Summerhill School
Known forCommunist activism,
founding member of the William Morris Society
Notable workA People's History of England (1938)
Political partyCommunist Party of Great Britain (CPGB)
SpouseVivien

Arthur Leslie Morton (4 July 1903 – 23 October 1987) was an English

Ranters
, and for the study The English Utopia.

Life

Morton was born in

communist group at the university around Maurice Dobb.[1][3]

After college he taught at

A.S. Neill's progressive school, Summerhill at that time in Lyme Regis. He then moved to London to write and run a bookshop in Finsbury Circus. In 1929 he joined the Communist Party of Great Britain and along with his wife, Vivien, remained a member for the rest of his life. Vivien was the daughter of the socialist Thomas A. Jackson.[3]

Morton belonged to a group of London left-wing intellectuals of the 1930s, while working as a journalist for the

Victor B. Neuburg. In 1932 and 1933, he was involved in a debate with F. R. Leavis, in the pages of Scrutiny.[3] He participated in the Hunger marches
of 1934.

His 1938 A People's History of England, published by the Left Book Club, was adopted quasi-officially as the CPGB national history, and later editions were issued on that basis.[3]

During the early part of the Second World War, he was the full-time district organiser of the Communist Party's East Anglia district and became chair of the district committee for many years.[3]

Morton spent most of the 1939–45 World War in the Royal Artillery labouring on construction sites in the Isle of Sheppey.[1]

He was part of the group of leading communist historians invited to Moscow in 1954/5, with

Christopher Hill, Eric Hobsbawm, and the Byzantine historian Robert Browning. Morton was a founding member of the William Morris Society in 1955.[1]
He participated in the People's March for Jobs in the early 1980s, a demonstration of 500 anti-unemployment protesters who marched to London from Northern England.

Morton died in 1987 at his home in The Old Chapel at Clare in Suffolk, aged 84.

Library

A.L. Morton bequeathed his library to the university library of

German Democratic Republic and named Wilhelm-Pieck-University after the GDR's first and only president, Wilhelm Pieck
). The collection comprises more than 3,900 volumes, including all foreign-language editions of A People's History of England, many contain hand-written comments by Morton.

Works

References

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d "R. W." {23 February 2014) "A.L.Morton,1903-1987" (obituary) Morris Society. Accessed: February 2014
  2. ^ Staff (19 June 1924) "University News" The Times
  3. ^ a b c d e Stevenson, Graham (19 September 2008) "Morton A L" Compendium of Communist Biographies. Accessed: February 2014

Bibliography

Further reading

External links
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