Nicolas Walter helped create the surge of political dissent in Britain in the 60s and 70s. For forty years he was a key contributor to the anarchist press, as well as being editor of the New Humanist and factual accuracy was one of his passions. “Getting the facts right is not history, but it is a necessary preliminary” was his answer to the charge of supposing that history consisted of nothing more than getting the facts right. He presents anarchism as a natural response of ordinary people to the problems presented by the society into which they are born. He appeared regularly on Thought for the Day, That Was the Week That Was and other TV and radio programmes. He perfected the art of writing sharp and succinct letters so that more than 2,000 of these were published in the broadsheet and literary press in his lifetime.

Previous publications include About Anarchism, which was translated into Serbo-Croat, Turkish, Chinese and many other languages. Nicolas Walter was a third generation anarchist activist. He was the father of Natasha Walter.

The Anarchist Past and Other Essays is edited by David Goodway whose own writing on anarchism includes (with Colin Ward) Talking Anarchy, published by Five Leaves.