I have decided from now on to skip the preface/introduction unless it was written by the author until I have read the book. Too many old theory books feature an introduction by some no name western academic going on a anti-stalin rant or something along the lines of “While this book has lost its relevancy because history has now ended with the fall of the USSR (Yes this intro was written in 2005, how can you tell?). Its still a quaint little thing.” And they are always like 50 pages long too. I’ve found myself spending a week trying to get through the 50 page intro because I keep putting it down after 2 pages only to then finish the rest of the book in the same amount of time it took me to figure out what the fuck Satre was saying at the start of Wretched of the Earth (Its actually a really great intro, but its one of those intros that is written with the assumtion that you’ve already read the book, so it may as well be at the end)
I have decided from now on to skip the preface/introduction unless it was written by the author until I have read the book. Too many old theory books feature an introduction by some no name western academic going on a anti-stalin rant or something along the lines of “While this book has lost its relevancy because history has now ended with the fall of the USSR (Yes this intro was written in 2005, how can you tell?). Its still a quaint little thing.” And they are always like 50 pages long too. I’ve found myself spending a week trying to get through the 50 page intro because I keep putting it down after 2 pages only to then finish the rest of the book in the same amount of time it took me to figure out what the fuck Satre was saying at the start of Wretched of the Earth (Its actually a really great intro, but its one of those intros that is written with the assumtion that you’ve already read the book, so it may as well be at the end)
The first Communist Manifesto I got was like this, going on about “the dustbin of history”. It probably makes publishers less scared to print it.
I cut it out with scissors.
I hate this. It took me way too long to realise the intro usually just doesn’t fucking matter and I can just hit da bricks to the actual book.