Many Different Kinds of Love. A history of the present by Michael Rosen
Michael Rosen does not describe himself as an historian but that doesn’t stop him from writing interesting and important histories mainly of the present or near present.
His memoir of the 1950s and some of the 1960s, So They Call You Pisher, is relatively rare account of someone growing up on the left in that period. It’s not only that of course, but it’s an important addition to a, so far, relatively slim number of volumes covering the period from that perspective.
His more recent The Missing is the account of his search for his relatives- a search which took many years and involved painstaking research- and what happened to them. Some, too many, ended up murdered by the Nazis.
One of his latest books which covers the present day is Many Different Kinds of Love, out now in paperback form.
It spans the period from March 2020 when he fell ill with COVID-19, the time- 47 days- he spent unconscious in the ICU at the Whittington Hospital in North London, and his subsequent rehab. It continues to this day, although fortunately, considerable improvements have occurred.
The book consists of prose poetry, extracts from a daily diary nurses wrote while he was in the ICU and a range of messages and tweets.
When we think of COVID in Britain over the last two years, it tends to be about how many(far too many) have died, how many have been infected, how many have been and are in hospital. It’s all about statistics and graphs and models.
But it’s not just a Gradgrindian exercise in counting how dreadful it’s been. There are people involved here and Michael Rosen is one of them.
Particularly in the era of texts, tweets, e-mails, WhatsApp messages and so on (yes I use all of those) the chances of the historical record capturing events, compared to periods when things were written down and filed, is significantly reduced.
Of course Rosen’s book is not yet history, but it will in due course be an important part of the historical record of COVID.
Perhaps this all sounds a bit dull, as if I’d just emerged from the archives to write a quick post. The book is not dull but compelling perhaps most of all in focusing on what Long COVID is.
Many will already know through personal experience about what the impact of COVID is but Michael Rosen has written and put together a very human account which helps us to make sense of the last two years.
It will also be part of the public record that allows future generations to do that too.
Keith Flett convenes the socialist history seminar at the Institute of Historical Research, University of London
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