Working Translations

Working Translations

Han Ryner on the “Subjective” (from the Anarchist Encyclopedia)

April 17, 2011 Shawn P. Wilbur
[ezcol_2third] I suppose if the stuff that keeps me from getting important translation done is also translation of a useful sort, then my failure to stay on task isn’t quite so serious. In any event, chipping away at the entries in the Anarchist Encyclopedia is useful, and Han Ryner (Henri Ner) remains a rather under-represented voice in English. (These are working translations; all the usual cautions apply.) Subjective, Subjectivism, Subjectivity. These words are directly opposed to objective, objectivism, objectivity. The senses of the words subject and object and their compound forms are so varied in philosophy that their semantic history […]
Proudhon Library

Proudhon, The Theory of Property – Chapter 2

March 24, 2011 Shawn P. Wilbur
Here’s another short chapter from The Theory of Property: THE THEORY OF PROPERTY Pierre-Joseph Proudhon CHAPTER II That property is absolute: prejudice opposed to absolutism. The recognition or institution of property is the most extraordinary, if not the most mysterious, act of the Collective Reason, an act that much more extraordinary and mysterious as, by its principle, property rejects collectivity and reason equally. Nothing is more simple, more clear than the material fact of appropriation: a corner of land is unoccupied; a man comes and establishes himself there, exactly as the eagle does in his canton, the fox in a […]
Proudhon Library

Proudhon clears things up

January 17, 2011 Shawn P. Wilbur
[ezcol_2third] Proudhon was fond of scandal and provocation—and it got him, and his friends, into hot water. In his System of Economic Contradictions, he wrapped his already provocative thesis about the evolution of institutions around a scandalous narrative about “the hypothesis of God.” Proudhon was fascinated with Christianity, and wrote about it from a variety of perspectives and in a variety of tones, but he is probably best remembered for writings like his “Hymn to Satan” and the final chapter of the first volumes of the Economic Contradictions, where he worked himself up to a sort of declaration of war […]
The Sex Question

Jeanne Deroin, “Letter to the Associations on the Organization of Credit” (1851)

December 15, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
[ezcol_2third] The radical literature that any of us are actually familiar with always seems to be just a drop in the bucket. There are masses of largely ephemeral publications in every language, and all of the advances in digital archiving have only really begun to make any sort of dent in the work to be done. We can’t ignore all that ephemera, unless we’re content with a sort of abstract, top-down understanding of our traditions. After all, for every Proudhon, there were a dozen Greenes and Langlois, and for every one of them there were dozens of Junquas and Blackers, […]
Working Translations

Emile Pouget, “Sabotage” (from the Almanach du Père Peinard, 1898)

November 29, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
This short essay on sabotage covers some of the same ground as Pouget’s famous book, but where that work is in some ways rather scholarly, this piece, from the 1898 Almanach du Père Peinard, is written in the language of the street. It’s profane in places, sometimes rather gratuitously so, and that poses some translation problems. Mitch Abidor has previously translated the piece for the Marxists.org archive, and in a few places I have followed his translation more or less word-for-word. In others, our translations diverge significantly. And then there are a whole series of stylistic differences. Enjoy! LE SABOTTAGE […]
The Sex Question

André Léo, “Communism and Property” (1868)

September 13, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
Victoire Léodile Béra (1824–1900), aka André Léo, was a French novelist, socialist and feminist. She was married to Gregoire Champseix, a member of Pierre Leroux’s circle, and Benoit Malon, the “integral socialist,” but was herself every bit as formidable as either man. She participated in the Paris Commune, and delivered a rather fiery speech on “The Social War” in its aftermath, which raised hackles at the League of Peace and Freedom. And she was a delightfully clear, direct writer and speaker. It’s been a lot of fun to work on some translations of her work. COMMUNISM and PROPERTY The question […]
The Sex Question

A socialist-feminist document from 1849

August 31, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
[ezcol_2third] FRATERNAL ASSOCIATION OF THE SOCIALIST DEMOCRATS OF BOTH SEXES FOR THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL EMANCIPATION OF WOMEN 1849 —————- DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES In the name of God and the solidarity which links all the member of the great human family; We affirm that women have the same right as men to liberty, equality and fraternity. Liberty, for woman as for man, is the right and the power to develop and exercise freely and harmoniously all his physical, intellectual and moral faculties, without any limit but respect for the rights of each. All liberties are solidary; one cannot undermine any […]
egoist anarchism

W. Curtis Swabey, “The Ethics of Stirner” (1912)

August 3, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
When I first encounter the French version of this text, I was aware that I might be translating a translation, but the article was interesting enough to make the work worth the bit of time it took—and it was quite a while before I finally tracked down the original English version. Now that I have the original text, it’s interesting to see to what extent the sense of the work survived the double-translation, so I have simply added the original to the post containing my translation. [ezcol_1half] The Ethics of Stirner To all who have been fortunate enough to read […]
anarchist individualism

E. Armand, “Our Rule of Ideological Conduct” (1922)

August 2, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
Notre ligne de conduite idéologique Dans tous les lieux, les individualistes de notre tendance veulent instaurer — dès maintenant et dans tous les temps — un milieu humain fondé sur le fait individuel et dans lequel, sans contrôle, intervention, immixtion quelconque de l’Etat, tous les individus puissent, soit isolés, soit associés, régler leurs affaires entre eux, au moyen de libres pactes, résiliables après préavis et cela pour n’importe quelle activité, que l’association soit l’œuvre d’une personnalité ou d’un collectivité. Leurs associations volontaires sont des unions de camarades, basées sur l’exercice de la réciprocité ou « égale liberté ». Les individualistes […]
Working Translations

Joseph Leroux, “Your Nationalities” (1892)

May 30, 2010 Shawn P. Wilbur
[ezcol_2third] [Here is one of three essays from a pamphlet on nationalism, by Pierre Leroux’s son, Joseph.] DOCTRINE OF HUMANITY YOUR NATIONALITIES   Extract from a letter published in the the arbitrator, a journal of the friends of peace, appearing in London under the direction of W[illiam] R[andall] Cremer, chevalier of the Legion of Honor, member of the English Parliament.   My dear Cremer, It is always with the most lively interest that I follow the efforts made to give a solution to the problem of peace. I see that at Rome, at the Inter-Parliamentary Congress, one has thrown at […]