fiction

fiction

Lizzie M. Holmes, “World’s Exposition in the Year 2,000” (1896)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WORLD’S EXPOSITION IN THE YEAR 2,000. (A sketch which did not win the prize in the late Times-Herald competition.) The sun rose and sent a burst of glory over the sparkling lake, and glittering, smokeless city, that seemed to spring out of the water itself and stretch far away toward the western sky. At the same instant, music rich, soft, all-pervading, swelled out upon the still, sweet air, strains that could be heard in all parts of the city, and whose source could not be determined by the sound; a grand succession of rich harmonies in new and inspiring modulations, […]
fiction

May Huntley (Lizzie M. Holmes), “A Common Story Seldom Told” (1895)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
A COMMON STORY SELDOM TOLD. Two women sat in the dusk of a summer evening, where the glow from a western window fell on their faces, and the one star showing in the purplish radiance, looked in upon them sympathetically. Their voices were low and even—as voices grow in the hush of twilight when one revels in the “sweetness of doing nothing and confidences are so easy.” “There is something incongruous in hearing such words from your lips,” said the younger, a dark-eyed, stately woman whom others called haughty, but who was sweetness itself to the quiet, gentle lady at […]
fiction

Ricardo Mella, “Leoncio” (1888) (ES)

December 14, 2016
LEONCIO No es lo que suele llamarse un carácter excepcional. Es un tipo casi vulgar, pues que abunda en las sociedades modernas. Los datos mismos proceden de la vida real. No es, pues, una fantasía de la imaginación, y corro, por tanto, el riesgo de ofrecer como objeto de estudio lo baladí, lo insignificante, haciendo bostezar á mis lectores. Y en efecto: nada hallarán grandilocuente, noble, sublime, en este artículo; nada que se parezca á un gran carácter ó á un genio particular, extraordinario. La observación es mi único elemento, y esa buena señora raras veces tropieza con lo excepcional, […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Ross Winn, “The Archic (A Fairy Tale)” (1903)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Once upon a time, in a kingdom situated between two seas, the people kept a certain great monster, called an archic. This archic was a most ferocious beast with great iron claws and a mouth large enough to swallow a dozen men at a gulp. The people held this frightful monster in great esteem, altho it was a great burden to them, for it had to be fed constantly upon the fat of the land, and demanded human flesh and blood, as well as the choice fruits of the soil, and was always hungry. This savage beast had to be […]
fiction

Louise Michel, “Old Chéchette” (1884)

July 5, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
[one_half padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] Old Chéchette There are some beings so disgraced by nature, so strange to look at or hear, that their aspect alone is a subject for sad studies for some, of wild mockeries for others. Some have not always been this way: some of them have had some accident, whether moral or physical, while others, by letting themselves idly go from fatigue or laziness, are brought low to some degree and, on that slope, there is no reason for them to stop. Others still (and this is dreadful for humanity) become thus under the pressure of […]
fiction

Louise Michel, “The Clavier of My Over-Dream” (1867)

July 4, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
[one_half padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] The Clavier of My Over-Dream A few days ago, I slept in a lovely dream. I was free, in a boundless space, where I ascended as easily as one follows the paths of our valleys. I found myself in a monument, so vast that its edges seemed like a distant horizon. Silence filled the vaults, but I sensed their incredible resonance. I sat down at an instrument whose keyboard included so many rising and so many descending notes, that it must include many sounds indistinguishable to the human ear. When I put my hands on […]
fiction

Leon de Tinseau, “A Beautiful Nihilist” (fiction, 1892)

June 27, 2016 A Beautiful Nihilist
A BEAUTIFUL NIHILIST. From the French of Leon de Tinseau; V.E.T., Chateau Bange, Bordeaux. In 187-, somewhat before the tragic death of the least Czar, one of the most notable men of the Russian Empire was Prince Michael ——-, whose family name, an illustrious one, reasons of the highest importance forbid our giving. During a visit to France after the war, while at one of the receptions of the Princesse Lise, he met that superb daughter of General de Contremont, whom the Parisian world, springing to life again from its ashes, knew already as “la belle Madeleine,” a girl as […]
fiction

A Hunt to Death (1892)

June 22, 2016 A Beautiful Nihilist
A HUNT TO DEATH. A Beautiful Nihilist’s Contrivance to Elude Justice. I had settled myself in my corner and the train was already swinging at a good pace down the “Golden Valley” before I noticed, first, that I was not alone, and, second, that I was not in a smoking compartment. My fellow-traveler was a lady, clothed from head to foot in a traveling ulster with a deep cape, and closely veiled. I wanted a smoke very badly, and so I ventured to ask her if she had any objection. Imagine my astonishment when, instead of replying to my question, […]
fiction

André Léo, “The Young Girl and the Bird” (1850)

February 8, 2014 anarchisms_w4l2ii
It’s certainly no surprise to find work by André Léo in Pierre Leroux’s journal La Revue Sociale. The prolific writer, whose real name was Victoire Léodile Béra, was married to the editor, Grégoire Champseix. But much of her literary output was later, after Champseix’s death, and despite all the very interesting material that I have pulled from La Revue Sociale, I’ll admit that I have never been able to steal the time to give the journal all the attention I’m sure it deserves. So it was nice to find that members of L’Association André Léo have identified a number of […]