Benjamin Farrington (10 July 1891[1] –17 November 1974[2]) was an Irish scholar and professor of Classics, teaching in Ireland (1916–1920), South Africa (1920–1935), and Great Britain (1935–1956).

[3] In addition to his professional academic career he was also active in socialist politics, using his intellectual capabilities to speak and write on it.

[4] Such political commitments inevitably influenced his teaching style, giving him the reputation in South Africa of being an intellectual Marxist.

Keeping in mind the readership was also overwhelming Protestant, Farrington sought to frame the conflict as a cultural and political one, not one based on a religious divide as some might.

Nonetheless, at the same time Farrington formed the Irish Republican Association of South Africa (IRASA), which launched its own newspaper The Republic in November 1920.

The front of the first edition of the paper featured a portrait of Terence McSwiney, the Lord Mayor of Cork who had just recently died on a hunger strike.

[7][5] In November 1921, Farrington was elected by the IRASA to be the organisation's delegate to the Irish Race Conference in Paris to be held in January 1922.

However, what was posed to be a great feather in Farrington's cap ended in disaster as the convention was racked with in-fighting between those for and against the newly signed Anglo-Irish Treaty.

[7]>[5] Following the convention, a dejected Farrington returned to South Africa where in The Republic he broke the IRASA's own policy of neutrality on the issue of the Anglo-Irish treaty to attack De Valera and his cult of personality.

[7][5] Instead of actively campaigning, Farrington withdrew and became to study the work of Irish Syndicalist James Connolly, of whom he became an admirer.

In 1921 South African Communist Party was formed, but despite Farrington's newfound interest in Connolly he declined to join.

From 1915 to 1917 he pursued a master's degree in English from University College, completing his thesis in 1917 on Percy Bysshe Shelley's translations from Greek.