I have previously posted a short excerpt from Louise Michel’s novel, The Imperial Bastard, which featured Bakunin as a main character. Michel also adapted some elements from that novel in dramatic form as Nadine, a political tragedy set in the Polish rebellions of 1846. I’ve posted a working translation of that play now at the Working Translations blog. As with all of these new translations, there are some rough spots to smooth, but in this case it’s mostly a case of making sense of the details of the stage directions, and I think all the charm of Michel’s Bakunin comes through.
The Sex Question
“La Frondeuse” zine, Issues 3 & 4
The Black and Red Feminism zine has been reborn as La Frondeuse [The Troublemaker, or The Anti-Authoritarian.] The name is borrowed from one of Séverine’s collections. Issue 3 features works by Louise Michel, Paule Mink and Séverine. Issue 4 contains works by Jenny d’Héricourt under various pen-names. The name-change comes with a bit of fancy repackaging, and will be retroactive. I’ll be revising and repackaging the material from the two issues of Black and Red Feminism as issues of La Frondeuse, and a number of titles from the old Corvus catalog will be expanded and revised in uniform editions. With […]
fiction
Louise Michel, “Old Chéchette” (1884)
[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 […]
Uncategorized
Louise Michel’s utopian fiction
Black Coat Press has just published translations of two of Louise Michel’s utopian novels, The Human Microbes (1887) and The New World (1888). They were part of a projected 6-volume science-fiction series. Brian Stableford, who also translated a collection of Han Ryner’s stories, The Superhumans, and who is well-known as a prolific author and translator, did the translations. I’ve read parts of The Human Microbes in French, and it’s a wild ride. I’m putting my order in for these two volumes right away.