Clarence Blaine Denning grew up in inner city Detroit, one of five brothers with a father who worked the auto line after time in the League of Revolutionary Black Workers. His literary career began with him writing on college basketball for a local newspaper. A career as a sports columnist seemed promising but he left it all behind for politics. At the time he leaned into the left-wing scene via Detroit’s Trotskyist groups but found the discussions boring and make-believe. Graduate school in history fell short, bogged down in race theory like afropessimism when he was really looking to read Capital and Aristotle. Tired of the left’s compromises, he found the SS African Mercury online, connected with the editors, and now contributes pieces on race, labor history, and slavery, his work clear-eyed with a thread of possibility.

ARTICLES

The Insufferable Being of Blackness | Winter-Spring 2025