Month: April 2014

Proudhon Library

More on Proudhon’s “Theory of Property”

April 9, 2014 Shawn P. Wilbur
I needed a change of pace for a couple of days, and went back to work on the still-daunting task of taking Proudhon’s The Theory of Property from the current draft translation to something well-contextualized and publishable. There’s a lot of work to do, including revisiting Proudhon’s earlier works on property, finishing work on the Appendix, translating more contextual material and consulting Proudhon’s manuscripts. Fortunately, more of the relevant manuscript material has become available, and I’ve been able to take some time away from other tasks to finish translating the “Disagreement Regarding the Posthumous Publication of Unpublished Works by P.-J. […]
Contr'un

Pruning the Rhizome (review of “Disruptive Elements”)

April 8, 2014 Shawn P. Wilbur
  Disruptive Elements: The Extremes of French Anarchism Ardent Press, 2014 available from Little Black Cart —— a review —— “Tant pis pour ceux qui souffrent et n’osent pas prêcher l’extermination et l’incendie!” Most history worth bothering with shakes things up. This is particularly true of radical history, and of that branch of radical history that involves rediscovering and re-presenting primary works from various radical currents. Sometimes, the shake-ups are comparatively pleasant, and we find, unexpectedly, that we have inherited marvelous gems, glimpses into the personalities and practices of those who came before us. Sometimes, they seem more like attacks, […]
Contr'un

More anarchist archives online

April 5, 2014 Shawn P. Wilbur
The International Institute of Social History has digitized several more of their important collections, as part of a large-scale digitization project. The collections include Max Nettlau’s papers, the Bakunin collection, the Louise Michel collection, the Alexander Berkman papers, the Fédération Jurassienne Archives, the Lucien Descaves papers, the Gustave Landauer papers, and several others. Many of the downloadable files are manuscript pages, varying dramatically in legibility, but there are also files of collected pamphlets, periodical issues, fliers, etc. So far, I’ve run across some issues of Josiah Warren’s Periodical Letter, a good scan of J. Wm. Lloyd’s “Anarchists’ March,” the published […]
Contr'un

Proudhon on the Criterion of Certainty (1841-1858)

April 2, 2014 Shawn P. Wilbur
I’ve pulled together some rough translations from Proudhon’s The Creation of Order in Humanity with existing translations from the Second Memoir on Property and Justice in the Revolution and in the Church. Together with The Philosophy of Progress, the collected texts cover some of the major stages in Proudhon’s treatment of the question of “the criterion of certainty.” I remember really being puzzled, the first time I read the book on Progress, about the extent to which this summary of Proudhon’s thought was focused on the question of certainty, and it has taken a long time, even after discovering his […]