Amanda Cockrell looks at the history of accusations of communism as a political attack, particularly as they affected screenwriters in the US during the ‘Red Scare’ of the 1940s and 50s, and finds echoes today. Repression fears art, she concludes, and as writers it is our job to see that it does. Seventy-five years ago, […]
The August Uprising, 1924 by Eric Lee
For three years following the Russian Revolution, the small South Caucasian country of Georgia was a democracy. But Stalin later ordered the Red Army to invade and to bring the country back under Russian rule. Communist attacks on political opponents, trade unions, cooperatives, and even the church sparked resistance, and an armed uprising broke out […]
Imagining Olga Gray, a beautiful spy
The bestselling author Rachel Hore tells Historia about the time research for a new novel unearthed a character so compelling that she took over, and changed, Rachel’s thoughts about her book – which became the recently-published A Beautiful Spy. Serendipity must be the origin of many a historical novel. I was researching an idea for […]