Welcome to the Kate Sharpley Library

The Kate Sharpley Library exists to preserve and promote anarchist history. (More information.)

Everything at the Kate Sharpley Library - acquisitions, cataloguing, preservation work, publishing, answering enquiries is done by volunteers: we get no money from governments or the business community. All our running costs are met by donations from members of the collective, subscribers and supporters, or by the small income we make through publishing. Please consider donating and subscribing.

We also try to promote the history of anarchism by publishing studies based on those materials - or reprints of original documents taken from our collection. Check out our books and pamphlets available for sale or explore our online documents or browse back issues of our Bulletin.

Our physical library (in California) includes books, newspapers, pamphlets, manuscripts and ephemera documenting the history of anarchist movements. Contact us to arrange a visit.

Recent news

September 2020 Kate Sharpley Library Bulletin online

KSL: Bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library No. 102, September 2020 has just been posted on our site. The PDF is up at: https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/m640h1

Contents:
Stuart Christie portrait https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/547fkw
The Kate Sharpley Library and Stuart: an appreciation "It would have been easy for Stuart to play the role of hero and champion. He rejected that and any other idea of him being a leader, which shows the measure of the man." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/hdr9dx
Stuart Christie 1946-2020 Anarchist activist, writer and publisher by John Patten “Without freedom there would be no equality and without equality no freedom, and without struggle there would be neither.” https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/rjdhgk
KSL Update Sept. 2020 https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/0gb6v4
Worth a Second Look No. 2. Re-reading Kuwasi Balagoon’s ‘Anarchy Can’t Fight Alone’ by Devin Hoff "Re-reading it still makes me feel like everything is possible and the revolution is just around the corner." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/q575dj
Berta Tubisman by Sergei Ovsiannikov. "This woman in her fifties evidently refused to confess to anything. Otherwise she would have received a death sentence." - Anatoly Dubovik https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/q83dbz
Prisoner 155: Simón Radowitzky by Agustín Comotto [Book review] by Richard Warren "As you sit out your pandemic isolation, pondering on the glaring inefficiencies of the state, the potential of local mutual aid, and the shape of the future, you could do worse than take a bit of inspiration from this impressive tale of one man’s resistance, modesty and commitment to justice." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/0k6fp1
Barcelona 1936 by Hugo Dewar "They too were storming heaven – do you think they fought in vain" https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/2fr0d9
Insulting the flag (1938) by André Prudhommeaux "every French person whose bond with the land of their birth is not made up exclusively of sordid jealousy and greed, is duty-bound to consider themselves a foreigner in their own country." https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/n2z4tc

Stuart Christie, 1946-2020

We're sad to report the death of our friend Stuart Christie. Our thoughts are with his many friends and comrades but especially with his close family who, only last year lost their mum and gran. We've posted a short obituary here. If you have memories of Stuart, please send them to us. We'd like to try and write something longer about his life.

July 2020 Kate Sharpley library non-bulletin online

NOT the bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library, No.3 July 2020 is here: https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/jh9xmb
Contents:
19 of July
25 of August: Happy birthday, Dan Chatterton
Joseph Lane
The Spanish resistance
Three pamphlets now online
Lucio Urtubia Jiménez 1931-2020

June 2020 Kate Sharpley library non-bulletin online

Still can't do a bulletin, but here is some reading matter. "NOT the bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library", No.2 June 2020 is here https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/d255rj
Contents:
New pieces on the Kate Sharpley Library website
Three articles by Albert Meltzer
Elsewhere (AK Press; Audio; Naples 1884; Bristol 2020)
Still going (Research on The 1945 split in British anarchism)

April 2020 Kate Sharpley library non-bulletin online

We can’t do a bulletin at the moment, but have done a brief newsletter with links to some reading matter recent and not-so recent.
"NOT the bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library", No.1 April 2020 is here: https://www.katesharpleylibrary.net/kd530b