My interest in politics started at the age of 11. The secondary school I attended in small-town Warwickshire marked the 1974 General Election with a mock election of its own. Pupils stood as representatives of the political parties standing in the national poll. Hustings were held, speeches given, ballot boxes set up. I found myself drawn to the Communist candidate. He was tall and pale, with the hair of a prog rock bassist. He painted utopian word-pictures of the egalitarian

Toddlers love books. Especially board books, with titles such as The Dinosaur Who Didn’t Eat Pizza . So it was that I found myself in a Brighton & Hove library, browsing board books with a two-year-old. One was prominently displayed face-out: A is for Activist . Intrigued, I investigated further. A is for Activist  is by Indonesian-born writer and illustrator Innosanto Nagara. A Marxist, Nagara lives in a co-housing community in Oakland, California. The book is written in a f