Letter

Publishing Trotsky in Spanish

Dear Comrades

We are writing to inform you that we have just published a CD-ROM containing the Spanish edition of Leon Trotsky’s Writings. The work of digitisation was based on the Spanish edition of the Escritos de Léon Trotsky, of the now defunct Editorial Pluma, which was published back in 1977. The CD-ROM contains more than 1,100 works, articles, letters and interviews, covering the period of 1929–40.

The reason for this enterprise lies in the fact that at the turn of the new century these works by Leon Trotsky are no longer available in Spanish. Thus, many young Trotskyists have been deprived of a valuable resource. For this reason, all the Trotskyist currents in Argentina have shown an interest in this work.

The CD-ROM comprises six books that cover 1929–30, 1930–32, 1932–34, 1934–36, 1936–38 and 1938 –40. It contains a name index in which brief overviews of the various political figures of the time are provided, thus enabling readers to get acquainted with the political background and trajectory of the person given. It also contains a search facility to find the different articles by title, topic or names of people. We will send you a CD shortly.

We have also started to research into Trotsky’s and the Trotskyists’ intervention in the Second World War. As far as we know, there is no work available yet in Spanish to appraise the rôle played by the Trotskyist movement during the war. What we do have are Trotsky’s articles contained in Escritos that deal with the war.

We intend to publish a compilation comprising works that highlight the experience of Trotsky and Trotskyism vis à vis the war, to show the intrinsic superiority of our movement in the face of major social upheavals, such as war and revolution. Right at this moment, we are going through the first phase of collecting materials. In this respect, we have so far read Al Richardson and Sam Bornstein’s War and the International, which provides many valuable insights into the activities of the Revolutionary Socialist League and the Workers International League in wartime Britain, and also a detailed account of the discussions around the Proletarian Military Policy. We have also read the issues of Revolutionary History dealing with this matter, and we are currently translating some of them into Spanish. Another source of information we are looking into are the Socialist Workers Party’s Internal Bulletins and International Bulletins from 1940–42 and 1944–45 that Al Richardson generously sent to us some time ago.

Finally, we would like to thank Al Richardson for his contribution to Estrategia Internacional, who alongside Pierre Broué, Paolo Casciola of the Centro di Studi Pietro Tresso and us collaborated on the dossier on the sixtieth anniversary of Trotsky’s assassination. The fact that institutions dealing with Trotsky’s work and the history of Trotskyism came together to issue a common work was quite an unusual event, and one that created a stir among young Trotskyists, and aroused interest in Trotskyist ideas.

Andrea Robles
CEIP Leon Trotsky