May Day 2016 & The Anarchist Stammer

The Institute had a secret rendevous with Ste Higginson, the writer-activist. We were to meet at some point between 12 and 1 at St George’s Hall plateau on Mayday 2016. We were to meet amongst the crowd, the revolutionaries, the red carnations, the insurgent, the dissatisfied, the angry, the dissenters, the people, just like the first time Jim Dick and Nellie Plochansky met all those years ago in 1913 – on a march. As a secret sign we were to carry our anarchist-communist flags and deliver to Ste, secretly, somewhere undetected in the crowd, surrounded by radicals, a black and red anarchist-communist envelope containing £468 – a writer-activist’s commission from The Institute. This money is a commission to write a play about the Liverpool Anarchist Communist Sunday School.

Mayday arrives. Rain. We arrive at St George’s Hall Plateau. There are no crowds, no revolutionaries, no people, just Lena, Neal and Sid with Gary and James waiting in the car. Lena carries the small anarchist flag, Neal carries the big one. We see Ste. He comes to greet us. The envelope is exchanged, but we have to tamper with the moment a little in order to take the photos. Ste, go back and stand over there please. Neal, could you look at the envelope when you pass it over please? OK, that’s a wrap…Will it be a revolutionary year?

The Anarchist Stammer

Ste Higginson delivered his performative lecture ‘The Anarchist Stammer’ AND his play The Anarchist Sunday School on Sunday, the 18th of September 2016. Ste treated us to a reading of Act 2 – to a packed and appreciative Institute. While the children played around the house under Gabriel’s expert supervision, the adults nattered passionately about the politics both inside and outside the play, Corbyn’s impending victory and a possible full reading of The Anarchist Sunday School in the near future. Diaries were opened and November pencilled in as a possible space-time to make it happen. Huge thanks to Ste (and for the 10p donation to the work of the Institute – see picture). The Anarchist Sunday School play now takes pride of place in the Study Room in Exile.