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.
Contr'un
Two new translations from “l’Almanach de la Question Sociale” for 1895
I’ve been puttering away at translating some short items from one of the radical socialist almanacs available online. This evening, I’ve posted an article on “Worker Mortality,” by Paule Mink, and an obituary of Emile Digeon, the hero of the Narbonne Commune and theorist of “rational anarchism.” There are quite a number of other interesting items in the Almanach de la Question Sociale. I’m working on a letter about Louise Michel at the moment [now complete], and I’ll probably return to a couple of other items by Paule Mink and Louise Michel as time allows.
Working Translations
Louise Michel, “Today or Tomorrow” (on Ravachol, 1892)
[Here’s another of the articles written shortly after Ravachol’s execution, in which Louise Michel added her bit to the Ravachol myth. There was a good deal of reference between the various contributions to L’Endehors. Michel began her article with a line from an article by Zo d’Axa and references Gustave Mathieu’s “The Little Ravachols will Grow.” This working translation is a little rough, but I’ll be finishing these as a group.] Today or Tomorrow. Louise Michel Everything is good which strikes or stings.[1] So much the better if these bandits have finished their work. The scaffold has started the party, […]
Anarchist Beginnings
Louise Michel, “Why we are Anarchists” (1891)
We are Anarchists because it is absolutely impossible to obtain justice for all in any other way than by destroying institutions founded on force and privilege. We cannot believe that improvement is possible, if we still keep up the same institutions, now more rotten than in the past, or if we merely replace those whose iniquities are known by new men. These latter become in their turn what the others were, or else become barren. After the gradual changes of past centuries the hour has come when evolution cannot be separated from revolution, as in all birth they must be […]