Champagne and Meatballs: An Autobiography of Sorts

Active for over 40 years with the Communist Party of Canada, BertWhyte was an underground historical rogue who challenged the illegalityof left-wing politics during the 1930s and onwards. His unforgettablelife story spans decades and continents, his wanderlust pushing himonto the Canadian railroad during the Great Depression as a migrantworker, into the controversial politics of Beijing and Moscow as apress correspondent, and out of the RCMP's reach during World WarII as a draft dodger. A cigar-smoking rabble-rouser, Whyte was known bymany as a most charming storyteller, never afraid to report theunbiased truth about even his own political brotherhood. A sanitizedCommunist memoir this is not.Brought to light and introduced by editor and historian Larry Hannant,Champagne and Meatballs is Bert Whyte's fascinatingmemoir written months before his death in Moscow in 1984. Brash, funny,irreverent, and entertaining, it highlights an important perspective onworld history while delving into the story of the man who was braveenough to live it.