The Underground Sea

The Underground Sea brings together texts by John Berger on mineworkers and miners'' strikes. The collection includes new transcripts and image-essay of his rarely seen BBC programme, Germinal ; a new transcript of a moving interview made in 1963 and his essay ''Miners''. Berger''s Germinal places itself in the heart of a Derbyshire mining village, with reflections on the everyday life of a typical pit community. Berger grapples with the politics of witness as he studies the miners'' labour and the wider community shaped in service to this work. Reflecting on their precarity, he goes back to Zola''s text for hope that ''a new world is germinating underneath the ground. And when it arrives, it will crack open the earth.'' The Underground Sea is a succinct, urgent collection of writing from Berger''s archive, edited within the political spirit of his work: as a set of action for today. Published to mark the 40th Anniversary of the 1984-5 Strike, and at a time when people in the UK and around the world are rediscovering the urgency and possibilities of collective action: much of which in response to the consequences of fossil fuels.

About the author

John Berger was born in London in 1926. His seminal Ways of Seeing was one of the most influential books on art in the twentieth century. His many books, innovative in form and far-reaching in their historical and political insight, include To the Wedding, King and the Booker Prize-winning novel, G. He died, aged ninety, in January 2017.Tom Overton is John Berger's biographer. He catalogued the Berger archive at the British Library and edited Portraits: John Berger on Artists and Landscapes: John Berger on Art. He lives in Sheffield.Matthew Harle is a writer and curator. His latest books include Black Arsenal and Mirror Reflecting Darkly. His curating explores the cultural histories of everyday life, most recently in the retrospective People Make Television at Raven Row in 2023.

Product details

• Authors: John Berger
• Assisted by: Matthew Harle (Editor), Tom Overton (Editor), Overton Tom (Editor)
• Publisher: Canongate Books
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 04.01.2024
• EAN: 9781805302995
• ISBN: 978-1-80530-299-5
• No. of pages: 128
• Dimensions: 140 mm x 220 mm x 20 mm
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies; Non-fiction book; SOCIAL SCIENCE / Sociology / General, POLITICAL SCIENCE / Labor & Industrial Relations, Trade Unions, Industrial Relations, Social and cultural history, Literary studies: fiction, novelists & prose writers, Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers, c 1980 to c 1989, Mining Industry, Sociology: work and labour, BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Labor / General, Extractive industries, BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Labor / Unions, LITERARY CRITICISM / Novel as Form