By Sasha Lilley
Against the Grain, KPFA
March 18th, 2020
There are many ways that the crisis brought about by the coronavirus is exceptional. But as Peter Linebaugh reminds us, pandemics throughout history have been met both by attempts by elites to extend their domination and the people’s attempts to resist while surviving. The noted historian weighs in plagues, from antiquity to Covid 19.
Resources:
Peter Linebaugh, “Lizard Talk; Or, Ten Plagues and Another: An Historical Reprise in Celebration of the Anniversary of Boston ACT UP”
Sasha Lilley is a writer and radio broadcaster. She is the co-founder and host of the critically acclaimed program of radical ideas, Against the Grain. As program director of KPFA Radio, the flagship station of the Pacifica Network, she headed up such award-winning national broadcasts as Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan. Sasha Lilley is the series editor of PM Press’s political economy imprint, Spectre.
Check out more from Sasha Lilley
Peter Linebaugh is a child of empire, schooled in London, Cattaraugus (NY), Washington, DC, Bonn, and Karachi. He has taught at Harvard University and Attica Penitentiary, at New York University and the Federal Penitentiary in Marion, Illinois. He used to edit Zerowork and was a member of the Midnight Notes Collective. He is the author of Stop, Thief!, The London Hanged, The Many-Headed Hydra (with Marcus Rediker), The Magna Carta Manifesto, and introductions to Verso’s selection of Thomas Paine’s writings and PM’s new edition of E.P. Thompson’s William Morris: Romantic to Revolutionary. He lives in the region of the Great Lakes and works at the University of Toledo in Ohio.
