Saint Ravachol

Ravachol spent his life as a sort of criminal jack-of-all-trades—smuggler, counterfeiter, grave-robber, murderer, bomber—and then, at the end of that career, was made a secular saint, “the violent Christ of anarchy.” And he was hardly the only one of the illegalists and attentateurs who was subsequently mythologized. Indeed, in the long war between anarchists and the agents of capitalism and the state, mythology has been a tool used on both sides. The items collected here are drawn from that war and are part of a literature in which history and myth are often inextricable. The collection includes items previously contained in the archives Relics of Saint-Ravachol and A Beautiful Nihilist.

Saint Ravachol

Letter to Constant Martin, April 11, 1892

July 10, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur
A letter from Ravachol One of our colleagues publishes a letter from Ravachol, communicated to him by an anarchist, Mr. Constant Martin, to whom it had been addressed. Here is the text of that letter:   Conciergerie, Cell 4, April 11, 1892.             Dear friend, I thank you for the feelings of gratitude and for your desire to see the trial go in my favor. I am not deluding myself. I am waiting to be sentenced to death. It is what I want, for live without liberty is too sad when one has the idea but cannot give it vigor. […]
Saint Ravachol

Letter to the Police Prefect

July 10, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur
Paris, March 30, 1892       Monsieur Lozé I learn from the newspapers that you are sure of catching me. Well, let me tell you that you will not take me alive at least; dead, it is possible, I am throwing myself in the Seine in [   ] I have had enough of life. Do not look for the guilty ones in the explosions of the Blvd. St. Germain and the rue de Clichy, for you will not find them. I am the guilty party. It is the magistrates I wanted [to strike]. But pardon me, for I am going to […]
Saint Ravachol

“Did Ravachol’s Head Utter a Word?” (August 17, 1892)

May 18, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur
Did Ravachol’s Head Utter a Word? London Daily Telegraph Ever since the execution of Ravachol a lively controversy has been going on as to the real nature of the “last cry” which he uttered just as the knife of the guillotine was falling upon his neck. Whether he intended to shout “Vive la République!” or “la Révolution!” or “la Révolte!” will never be known, as he had only cried: “Vive la re———” when his head was severed from his body. Several persons who were close to the guillotine declare that they distinctly heard the final syllables “———publique” issue from the […]
poetry

Albert Millaud, “Ravachol” (March 30, 1892)

May 18, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur
[one_half padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] RAVACHOL Ravachol? Who knows Ravachol? Who knows how He is made? Is he a being? Is he a myth? Is he a man? Is he blond as honey, brown as a Spaniard? Is he small? average? stocky? short? tall? superb? Fat? lean? a bit of both? long-haired? bald? beardless? Alas! who will tell me how Ravachol is made? Ravachol? Where does he lie? Is he in France? in Asia? In Senegambia? or in Polynesia? Of what gulf, isle or cape does he tramp the soil? In what wood? on what mount ? in what virgin forest? […]
Saint Ravachol

Louise Michel, Today or Tomorrow (1892)

May 18, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur
Today or Tomorrow. Louise Michel Everything is good that strikes or stings. So much the better if these bandits have finished their work. The scaffold has started the party, and the fire will beat its wings over the apotheosis. The blood of Ravachol splashes, from his false collar to his cuffs, the cold man of the Élysée. The Élysée! That’s the spot that draws the looks! From it the grand finale, the final bouquet will rise into the air, and the cross of Our Lady of the Slaughter will be the streetlamp. The sun has risen red in the prologue, […]
Saint Ravachol

Ravachol, My Ideas on the Army

May 17, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur
My Ideas on the Army. (l‘Insurgé, September 16, 1893) ____ Since some have criticized my disobedience of the law on recruitment, I will explain my conduct here. If I refused to bear arms, it is because according to my principles I do not recognize border. For me, there is no foreigner. All the nations are sisters and I reckon that their children should love one another a bit more than they have thus far, thanks to the universal propaganda spread to prevent them from it. Whether we are born under the beautiful skies of Italy, in the cold lands of […]
biography

Olga Liubatovitch and other women from the Russian nihilist movement

August 23, 2013
As a companion to the Frondeuse series, I’ve assembled a collection featuring Stepniak’s “A Female Nihilist,” an account of the life of Olga Liubatovitch, together with a selection of poems and popular journalism relating to other women involved in the struggles against the Czars and their government. The popular accounts naturally made the most of the apparent contrasts between the beauty and education of those women, and the violence of their acts.
fiction

The Exploits of Ravachol (in progress)

November 29, 2011 Shawn P. Wilbur
THE EXPLOITS OF RAVACHOL  The Man with the Dynamite PART ONE THE CRIME OF CHAMBLES I THE INN OF THE GROTTO In these Exploits of Ravachol, the Man with the Dynamite, we will not write a novel, but a history. Why would we take the trouble to invent, when it is enough for us, in order to make the most riveting, original and dramatic narrative that could be imagined, to let speak only the facts, so strange and so striking, the completely unknown facts that we are going to make known,—and to simply recount the life of the man who, […]