“Freedom – Is It a Crime?”: Herbert Read’s The Green Child and Human Rights in Post-war Britain

Abstract

Modernist author Herbert Read was best known as an art critic, anarchist, and poet, but one of the few works of his which remains in print is his little understood only attempt at fiction: his novel, The Green Child (1935). The novel updates a medieval tale about mysterious green-hued children who suddenly appear in a village, and in Read’s work, the so-called Green Children set off a narrative where, I argue, that individual liberties like freedom of movement and political debates around human rights and refugees are staged and thought through. In reapproaching this semi-fantastical tale, I analyse how Read imagines a form of social utopia and also offers commentary on the mid-20th century refugee crisis.

Keywords

• herbert read
• modernist novel
• human rights
• refugees
• immigration
• speculative fiction
• george orwell