Eric Hobsbawm

Eric Hobsbawm, one of Britain’s greatest historians, died on 1 October aged 95, leaving behind him a considerable and varied body of writing. He was a lifelong communist but one whose views were trenchant, critical and never formulaic. His life in many ways mirrored the great events of the 20th century about which he wrote so well: the rise of imperialism, fascism and communism was as much part of his life as his books.

He wrote for a wide readership: “Choosing to write for a broad public isn’t only my personal choice. I regard it as part of a long English tradition. After all, this is a country in which even the most important thinkers have expressed their views for the broad public, going back to Adam Smith via Charles Darwin to name but two” (1).

Hobsbawm wrote for many years for Le Monde diplomatique, starting in October 1966. At the end of the 1990s the collaboration took a new turn, when no French publisher proved willing to take on his much admired The Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century, 1914-1991, published in English in 1994 (2) and translated into dozens of languages. Pierre Nora of Gallimard tried to justify this omission saying one had to “take into account the intellectual and ideological conjuncture” of the time. Le Monde diplomatique and the Belgian publishing house Complexe decided to publish the book themselves. The book was a huge success and sold widely, proving that in France popular interest in engaged world history had not died, but was simply waiting to be re-ignited. Hobsbawm contributed durably and deeply to that resurgence.