Eric Hobsbawm (1917–2012,) fully Eric John Ernest Hobsbawm, was a British Marxist historian and intellectual. He was well known for his illustrious histories of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, such as The Age of Extremes 1914–91 (1994,) and his unflinching Marxism.
Born in Alexandria, Egypt, to an English father and Austrian mother, Hobsbawm grew up in Vienna and Berlin, was orphaned at 14, and moved to England in 1933. He attended St. Marylebone Grammar School-London and King’s College-Cambridge, receiving a bachelor’s degree (1939,) a master’s degree (1942,) and a doctorate (1951.)
Hobsbawm joined the Communist Party in 1936 and served in World War II. He taught at King’s College 1949–55 and at Birkbeck College-University of London 1947–82.) After his formal retirement in 1982, he taught at several universities in the U.S., notably Stanford and MIT.
A lifelong Marxist, Hobsbawm never resigned his membership of the Communist party and never expressed regret for his commitment to the communist cause.
Hobsbawm was one of the world’s best-known historians. His books were translated into over 50 languages and sold millions of copies across the globe. His publications include The Age of Revolution: 1789–1848 (1962,) The Age of Capital: 1848–75 (1975,) The Age of Empire: 1875–1914 (1987,) and Age of Extremes: A History of the World, 1914–91 (1994.) His other books include Primitive Rebels (1959,) Industry and Empire (1968,) How to Change the World: Tales of Marx and Marxism (2011.)
Hobsbawm did a ten-year stint as the New Statesman’s jazz critic 1955–65, writing under the pseudonym Francis Newton. His appraisals were later collected and published under Hobsbawm’s own name as The Jazz Scene (1989.)
Hobsbawm’s autobiography is Interesting Times: A Twentieth-Century Life (2003.) Gresham College’s Richard J Evans wrote the biography Eric Hobsbawm: A Life in History (2019.)
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Nations without a past are contradictions in terms. What makes a nation is the past, what justifies one nation against others is the past, and historians are the people who produce it.
—Eric Hobsbawm
Topics: Nationality
War has been the most convenient pseudo-solution for the problems of twentieth-century capitalism. It provides the incentives to modernization and technological revolution which the market and the pursuit of profit do only fitfully and by accident, it makes the unthinkable (such as votes for women and the abolition of unemployment) not merely thinkable but practicable. What is equally important, it can re-create communities of men and give a temporary sense to their lives by uniting them against foreigners and outsiders. This is an achievement beyond the power of the private enterprise economy when left to itself.
—Eric Hobsbawm
Topics: War
The only certain thing about the future is that it will surprise even those who have seen furthest into it.
—Eric Hobsbawm
Topics: Future
Historians are to nationalism what poppy-growers in Pakistan are to heroin-addicts: we supply the essential raw material for the market.
—Eric Hobsbawm
Topics: Nationality
There is not much that even the most socially responsible scientists can do as individuals, or even as a group, about the social consequences of their activities.
—Eric Hobsbawm
Topics: Science
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