My Godforsaken Life: the Memoir of a Heretic
Humanist campaigner and former President of the National Secular Society, Barbara Smoker, has published her autobiography. Barbara is Life President of the South East London Humanist Group, having been one of the group’s founders back in the 1960s and Chair for many years. This is what it says on the fly cover:
“Barbara Smoker has been at the forefront of radical movements for seventy years. Against: religion, nuclear weapons and illegal wars. For: humanism, abortion, prison reform, freedom of speech, voluntary euthanasia and LGBT rights. At ninety-five she is still campaigning. Throughout her life she has been twenty years ahead of her time in promoting the causes many of us now take for granted.
“Barbara’s autobiography is a compelling account of her intellectual journey, her ruthless focus on ethics and principles, and her eccentric bloody-mindedness in challenging the accepted and wrong wisdom of the day. She has encountered many intellectuals – Bertrand Russell, Michael Foot, Jonathan Miller, Sir Michael Holroyd – and contributed to literary life through her work for the Shaw Society, her books on humanism and voluntary euthanasia, and her verse, innumerable articles and pamphlets. For radical reformers Barbara Smoker’s life is a lesson in perseverance and principle.”
My Godforsaken Life: the Memoir of a Heretic is available from Thornwick Press for £11.99.
