Richard Seymour interviewed on “‘Mourning and Militancy’”

“So at most, I think we’re seeing the possibility of regenerating a left that has previously been ground down to the scale of atoms, one that if it adapts creatively to the coming defeats can prepare the ground for success. But that means recognizing that the history of the left is a history of defeats; it is a history of the vanquished. We gain our victories out of a dialectic of defeats—from the crushing of the Paris Commune to the birth of mass socialist parties; from the horror of 1914 to the electrifying revolution of 1917. If we extend our thinking temporally, projecting the lessons of defeat into future gains, we can exploit this opportunity; if we expect instant gratification, we will just collapse in trauma and resignation.”