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Big Flame: Building the Movements, New Politics at the WCML

On Thursday 6 February, Max Farrar and Kevin McDonnell presented a rousing discussion about their edited volume on the group Big Flame. We were delighted to host them, and were able to invite members of our ‘Big Flame: Inspiring Community Organising Then and Now’ project group to chat to Max, Kevin, Keith Venables, Tom Bimpson and Greg Dropkin about their experiences and what they’ve taken with them into their present lives.

Prior to the true kick-off of the event, Big Flame Project Coordinator, Amie, explained how the sessions had been developing and invited group members Jack, Jason, and Ley to share their thoughts with the audience. You can see more content from the sessions via our Instagram. 

Below, Jack, Jason, and Ley reflect on what the event meant to them.

 

 

Ley Edmonton-Douse

“A Way of Life”: Meeting the Names from the Archive Boxes

While undergoing a year-long project, there are certain milestones you know you’re going to reach, and so you build up anticipation for them. When signing up to be a part of the youth collective the Working Class Movement Library has assembled to help plan an exhibition about the 70s-through-80s activist group Big Flame, it was a stated goal that we were going to be given the chance to meet members and talk to them directly about their experience of the group. The first instance of this—before more formal oral history interviews are to be conducted in the coming months—was on a February evening to celebrate the release of a book by two former members, about their time within the group.

It would be these two members we were first introduced to, Kevin and Max. At once, the four of us from the exhibition group were somewhat disarmed. Speaking for myself, at least, seeing the energy we’d found in the dozen archive boxes was instant. In the nearly 5 months we’d spent reading the archival material, we had found the group to be full of wit; and this was still the case with its members, decades later.

We had only a brief interval to talk to Max and Kevin before their presentation to a larger group, but we moved through a number of topics: the precursor to intersectionality in the group; the international nature & inspirations; how activism has changed since the ‘70s; and how today’s technology impacts this. We breezed through these with insightful haste, which I know I can’t wait to pick up again in more structured interviews.

The presentation further brought to life this already dynamic group: tales of summer schools and witty remarks about radicalising the youth; idealistic views of the world and how the revolution for some in the early ‘70s felt within touching distance. This gave us context impossible to find in the archive boxes alone. The attendees of the talk—made up in no small part by the pseudonyms and contributors we had seen in old archival copies of the Big Flame newspaper—soon descended into a sort of open discussion about their time in the group.

It was only fitting that one former member of Big Flame remarked near closing that the group was “a way of life”. After spending just one evening with a few of its past members, it isn’t difficult to see why.

 

Jason Lee

It was honestly fantastic to chat with some of the former members of Big Flame. While it’s clear there are some characters in the archives it’s a real privilege to see them in person too! They made their motivations, local work and opinions so vividly clear upon our chat. It was interesting also to hear why some left yet while Big Flame itself is no more, it is so obvious that these comrades are still fired up continuing their struggle for a better world around them.

Where there’s despair often in detachment, watching the news as we do, our chat and the panel instead felt like a real moment of solidarity, one that fuels our continued struggles. It is a real gift to be able to learn from them, something we wish to continue throughout the project and something we wish to pass on when we come to curate the coming exhibition!

Jack Clarke

Big Flame: Nothing Left Except a Way of Life

On 6th February, I found myself in a room packed with people who’d been shaking up the system before I was even born. Former members of Big Flame gathered to launch ‘Big Flame: Building the Movements, New Politics’, a book reflecting on their time in the revolutionary socialist and feminist organisation. It was a night of stories, history, and a reminder that the struggle never really stops—it just takes on new shapes, new names, and new battlegrounds.

Sitting there, listening to these former Big Flamers talk, was equal parts inspiring and surreal. It’s not every day you find yourself in a room full of people who, decades ago, were causing so much bother for the establishment that they’re still being talked about now. It felt a bit like stepping into a time machine, except instead of flying cars and talking air fryers, the future looked a hell of a lot like the past—same fights, same injustices, just different branding and an overpriced app where leftists now spell it ‘Xeftist’ to avoid getting chinned with a Right hook.

One of the things that struck me was how Big Flame never seemed to settle for easy labels. They weren’t trying to fit into neat political boxes; they were working it out as they went, based on what was happening around them. Some influences came from Italy’s Lotta Continua, some from contemporary women’s liberation movements, some from community organising in Liverpool, where they first emerged from a local newspaper. They weren’t rigid like other leftist groups—no one was ever expelled, which is a miracle in itself. They were learning from people in struggle, not just showing up with a pre-packaged manifesto and telling people what to think.

They weren’t about top-down leadership or waiting for permission. They saw revolutionary change as something that came from the bottom up—workers, communities, marginalised groups pushing together for something better. The line that stuck with me most from the night was when one of the ex-members said, “Big Flame was a way of living for a lot of us.” You could tell they meant it. This wasn’t just a political group; it was life, purpose, a whole way of seeing and being in the world. There was a real sense of unfinished business. Some of them spoke about how, for a brief moment, Corbyn’s leadership gave them a glimpse of something familiar—a movement that felt like it could actually shake things up. And then, well, we all know how that went. But there was no wallowing in defeat, just an acceptance that the fight goes on. That’s the thing about capitalism—it’s persistent. But so are we.

Working on the Big Flame archive project at the WCML has been more than just a privilege—it’s felt like grasping onto something solid while everything else shifts underfoot. For a native Salfordian like me, since the expansion of MediaCity, Salford, to put it bluntly, has lost its community, its way of life. It’s fucked, to be honest. The old working-class solidarity that held everything together has been replaced with glass spires and £8 lattes that stare back at you with a stylised smile. But digging through Big Flame’s writings, there’s something grounding in seeing people who were just trying to figure things out, refusing to be told what their politics should be, refusing to be boxed in. One phrase I came across summed up their approach perfectly: “We should exploit contradictions with a screwdriver, not a steamroller.” Precise, careful, strategic—not just smashing things for the sake of it. Maybe Salford’s not beyond saving. Maybe we just need the right tools. And honestly, sitting in that room, hearing these stories, it just reinforced something I’ve felt for a while: not much has really changed. The issues they were fighting against—inequality, exploitation, racism, patriarchal capitalism—they’re still here. The only difference is the language and the tech we use to talk about them. The playbook remains the same.

But if Big Flame teaches us anything, it’s that there’s power in not going it alone. In building movements, in finding your community, in fighting for something bigger than yourself. They weren’t waiting for permission, and neither should we. Because at the end of the day, the struggle isn’t some abstract thing—it’s life. It’s how you choose to live it.

And like they said, Big Flame wasn’t just an organisation—it was a way of living.

 

The Big Flame Project group will continue their fortnightly workshops until June. They are about to begin developing their exhibition, which we hope will open in July of this year. Stay tuned for further updates!