This the first in a series of posts documenting the kinds of work that tends to fill my days lately, wide-ranging research and on-the-fly translation that often goes undocumented on the site. It’s a lot of what I’m doing these days and, honestly, even I have trouble keeping track of all of the minor bits of progress on multiple fronts. The goal is to post something in the “journal” category every week or so.
Some recent posts and page updates:
- Lewis & Ann Masquerier in the “Boston Investigator” (1834-1888) — Documentation of research on Ann Tabor, wife of Lewis Masquerier, and her family, with early texts by Ann and one of her brothers, added to the page. There’s more from the Masqueriers being transcribed, as I try to tidy up the files for Sociology: Or, The Reconstruction of Society, Government, and Property [Reconstructed].
- E. Armand in 1899 — Patreon freebie, documenting new-to-me publications and pseudonyms.
- The Anarchists’ Noël: Christmas Tales from “Le Libertaire” (1899-1913) — New translations, proving that anarchists may lack something in the “Christmas cheer” department.
- E. Armand, “En marge du vice et de la vertu” (1937) — A draft translation of this “selected essays” collection is now complete, with a pdf version and a significant expansion in the works.
And I started skimming through the run of l’anarchie again, from the beginning:
Another look at l’anarchie
“Demand everywhere ANARCHY, which appears every Thursday.” If only… — Back to 1905 and the sart of the run, to take another look for gems I might have missed and bits relevant to new projects. The start of the run is heavy on material from Albert Libertad and André Lorulot. Paraf-Javal’s L’Humanité, interview de son oncle par mon neveu is serialized in feuilleton form. There’s an ongoing discussion of “art and life.” Starting with No. 6, Mauricius contributes a series on “The Psychology of Sentiment,” under the general heading of “Le Culte de Moi” (The Worship of the Self.) In the same issue, Henri Zisly makes an appearance:
WORKS OF THE FLESH
Some reflections on the sexual drama discussed by “Qui cé” in l’anarchie no. 5.
Anyone, legally married or not, can only be a cuckold (a popular expression) if they are sexually deceived by their partner, that is to say, if she has, without male consent, engaged in carnal acts with another individual.
The same applies to women.
Here, there is what one might call an accident.
Anyone, legally married or not, cannot be a cuckold if, with the agreement of their partner, she has other (optional, of course) sexual relations. In this case, not being deceived at all, they are not consequently a cuckold. The same applies to the woman. Here, there is no longer an accident, but simply the satisfaction of natural appetites.
I assume this viewpoint is accepted by those free from sexual prejudice; therefore, if this happens to them, they obviously cannot consider themselves deceived.
The true solution to the sexual problem seems to be free and plural unions.
Henri ZISLY.
l’anarchie 1 no. 6 (18 mai 1905): 3.
As usual, with the individualist papers, there are plenty of those pithy little personal declarations on various subjects, which I always have a hard time passing by without a translation. For example:
TO LIVE
In a few lines, briefly, I will try to explain what I mean by living.
For me, to live is not to lead the petty life of so many individuals who, for a wage, toil away, without ever having asked themselves if their work has resulted in anything profitable for themselves or their fellow human beings.
No, that is not living, that is merely vegetating.
To live is to expend one’s strength and energy only in the way most suited to one’s own abilities and in work that brings a greater sense of well-being to those around oneself.
To live is to be able to fully satisfy all one’s needs; it is to love without compromise, to eat one’s fill, to drink according to one’s thirst, to work without constraint, solely because one deems it right to act in this way. It is taking advantage of all the new inventions resulting from progress and science, which today are only the preserve of a privileged few.
Living, therefore, is the complete and normal development of the individual, despite the countless obstacles that current society, so full of prejudice, has sown in its path. Prejudices must be rejected after examination in order to move towards greater happiness and harmony.
I believe that the work of anarchists must consist of forming people capable of this examination.
Camil Chavin
l’anarchie 1 no. 6 (18 mai 1905): 2.
In no. 12, another short discussion of “Anarchists and Anarchy:”
Anarchists and Anarchy
I read in a recent article that the dictionary defines the word “anarchy” as “disorder,” whereas the anarchist method aims only to contribute to Universal Harmony, that is, to natural order, and not to the “order” established by “civilization” and based on authority and economic inequality.
But doesn’t the dictionary definition reflect the understanding of the majority of people? It’s regrettable that such a false idea of anarchy can still be held.
However, it’s necessary to recognize that many individuals who call themselves anarchists are unaware of its fundamental principles:
They are anarchists because they like the name, because the word is — in their view — synonymous with “upheaval” or a host of other irrationalities, except for the main one that forms the basis of anarchy.
I want it to be clearly understood, in all classes of society, that we intend to bring our idea to life much more through the force of reason and logic than through hatred and violence, which would coerce individuals and make them repellent to us.
Now, since complete liberty is the goal of all our efforts, we want only “free men” among us, free from prejudice, conscious of their actions, and able to direct themselves by their own strength.
We do not want, as in the socialist ranks, those spineless beings, lacking willpower, who entrust the care of their destiny to one or more individuals: we want to be the sole masters of our own selves and admit no “leader.”
Only when the resistant and ignorant minds, and the so-called anarchists, are imbued and permeated by these ideas will they finally understand that we do not claim to bring about Disorder and Revolution, but simply the free choice of destiny through rational anarchy.
FREEDMAN
l’anarchie 1 no. 12 (29 juin 1905): 2.
Mauricius and Paraf-Javal continue to be frequent contributors. Zisly shows up in some debates it the correspondence. With no. 13, we see the first of what appears to be a series of “Fantaisies,” short literary fancies, not terribly different from the *nouvelles* or short stories, either in length or in content. Two examples:
FANTASY
IN THE BARRACKS
The soldier Jean Tristan went off, with a sullen face, towards the barracks, which had been almost deserted on Sunday. With a brutal gesture, he threw on the bed his belt — adorned with a saber, which gave it its metallic sound — and sat down on the “sack,” his face hard, his eyes blackened by still poorly digested anger.
On the bed next to his, one of the rare inhabitants of the room at that hour was absently leafing through a book. At the noise, he looked up at the new arrival, then, very calmly in front of the rage he immediately divined.
— What fly is biting you, Medieval? Has someone insulted the French army in your person?
The soldier thus challenged, who, of course, had nothing in common with the Middle Ages except the nickname, further accentuated the folds of his forehead and harshly said:
— Shut up, anarcho!
The other smiled, simply amused by this beginning of explosion. Marking the page of the book, he interrupted his reading and replied, calmly:
— You are not friendly, my dear Tristan. Let me ask you my question again: “What fly is biting you, or has bitten you, or is going to bit you?”
The other burst out: They had made him do some nice work earlier; a woman arrested, a cop requisitioning him, and him going quietly. For god’s sake! What she had told him about it, this female! And she was right after all… To arrest or help arrest a woman…!
— Whether it’s a man or a woman, what does it matter to you, Tristan, said the other.
— But a woman…, anyway, the respect due to the female sex…
The aforementioned “Anarcho” burst out with Homeric laughter.
— Well! said Jean Tristan, more and more annoyed, why are you laughing like an idiot? You have no more respect for a woman than…
— That means, old man, that I have just as much. This is the only difference between us: if you had contributed to the arrest of a man, your remorse would be transformed into admiration for yourself. I don’t look at things from the same point of view. For me, men and women are individuals, whom I respect to the same degree. Likewise, if they are an obstacle to my freedom, I consider them as much my enemies as the other and, pushing my logic to the end, I act in the same way towards them.
The Medieval stopped for a while, perplexed, forgetting for a few moments to keep his face contracted, then:
— It’s amazing. The little woman said the same thing to the cop who led her roughly and who told her that he only had “respect” for her because of her sex.
She even, I think, called me an “apprentice assassin.” My old friend, she’s definitely a friend of yours. What will become of us if women get involved now?
The other was thinking, his face serious; At Tristan’s reflection he smiled with pride:
— You are right to ask this question, comrade. You may wonder what will become of you and your likes if women get involved. So far, you see, our efforts, however useful they may have been, were only the first steps. Our revolt was incomplete, because the individual man can do nothing without the support of the individual woman. The woman deaf to reason, the woman, the inferior, the toy, whom we respect because we assimilate her to the child, the doll woman has almost always, until now, put herself in the way of all reasonable ideas, and the female slave took revenge for her slavery by being the slave-mistress, the one who prevented the brains from thinking which were kept at home, under the depressing action of her futility, of his stupidity almost always, the man who had become attached.
Something even more terrible. The female, not content with reducing her companion’s brain to inertia, was the mother of the little ones, the little ones with whom we play games, into whom we inculcate all the idiotic ideas, all the prejudices, who are stuffed with all the nonsense picked up from all sides. The woman, this slave, nipped the revolt from the bud. You, Tristan, are the child of one of these females: you have not yet been able to shake the yoke; I, André, the anarcho, as you call me, am the child of one of these females, and I only imperfectly knew how to break the chains that encircled me. My slave mother bowed her head when I was made a soldier, and I, the half-emancipated son of this mother, did not know how to express my revolt.
Women, until now, have, through their limited slave brains, stopped human effort. Let them raise their heads. Let them assert their individuality, Let them show themselves equal to man, if not in physical strength, then at least in intellectual value, and you will be able, Tristan, to wonder with fear, what you will become or rather what will become of the social organization of which you are only the victim. For you and those like you, I only want you to become conscious, to know how to see around you…
Anger has already risen within you at the idea that an imbecile cop has ordered you to help him in his task. You obeyed, but reflection made you see that your act was of little interest. You only made this observation in part, retaining your prejudices, without being able to escape from the education received up until then. Perhaps you would even have returned here very happy, with the feeling of duty accomplished if the individual you helped to deprive of his freedom, without even knowing for what reason, had been a man…
— It’s true, Jean Tristan admitted philosophically.
— No matter, you had a movement of individual revolt. If the arrested comrade knew that she was perhaps making an unreasonable man take a step towards reason, she would, I am sure, be almost happy with her misadventure.
And now, Medieval, you, who until now has treated me crazy, perhaps you will agree to listen to me sometimes. A man who knows how to listen is a reasonable being. Having reached this result I would already be happy. We will probably argue often, and that’s fine. If you know how to defend, step by step, the preconceived ideas of others, you will be all the more capable of defending those that your mind and logic have led you to have.
The Medieval and the Anarcho sat side by side on the same bed; the belt had slipped to the ground, their feet were carelessly placed on the sword; the finger of the Anarcho underlined the title of the book: Anarchy and Science. One felt that something new had crushed all the past of ignorance and servility.
Anna Mahé.
l’anarchie 1 no. 12 (29 juin 1905):2-3.
FANTASY
HIS SUNDAY
Jean Bulourd, a French soldier, brushed himself one last time, smoothed his young man’s blond mustache, looked at himself and seemed satisfied with his shine. It was Sunday, a day out, and the city, below the bastion, unfolded its vast panorama; it attracted him.
So he left, humming a harvest song, chanting in his naive verses the good and fragrant rhythm of the sickle cutting the wheat.
As he looked impeccable in his too-tight tunic and too-large kepi, the sergeant on duty let him go out; outside, he walked for a long time, without haste, without aim, he crossed poor streets running alongside the fortifications, where an acrid smell of frying grease and vinasse hung in the air; then less desolate streets where, on the thresholds, merchants chatted about business and the horrible crime of the day. His steps took him to a populous suburb where the lamentably colorful crowds of Sundays circulated, got drunk, insulted each other and sometimes fought.
Jean Balourd was still walking, but with the July sun a heavy boredom fell on him. The whole of Belleville, taking to the streets to conquer the bistros, frightened him; his eyes were not accustomed to contemplating these faces stigmatized by stultifying work and alcohol. Women with monumental buns invited him with vulgar gestures and comments; it almost frightened him. He quickened his pace; returned again towards the gates: he saw the same gray facades where misery seemed to ooze from the walls, and his sadness increased with the evening mist.
As he was good at arithmetic, he calculated that he would have to do a hundred and thirty more walks of roughly the same order, or die of another bout of boredom at the barracks.
One hundred and thirty Sundays! Ge had a long shudder, and a little revolt crept into his simple peasant brain. Why these three years of stupid life? For what?
He said the word patrie, “homeland,” and couldn’t understand… was the homeland the bastion? the factories that he could still see in the distance? The pestilential streets? Yes, it was to defend this that he had obediently gone to the barracks, that he had left the fields where he breathed, and Toinette the fruit bat, who let herself tumble so prettily into the wheat.
The memory of Toinette disturbed him, and, as a pissoir was in his way, he touched himself roughly… and with the same hand, the military spirit already possessing him, he wrote next to the various scribbles, on the medical advertisements:
“Eight hundred and sixty-five days and escape.”
Then slowly, heavily, Jean Balourd returned towards the bastion, passed through the gate of this prison, where well-behaved little French children are kept for three years.
Eugène Péronnet.
l’anarchie 1 no. 13 (6 juillet 1905): 2.
A brief, critical take on individualism, from a largely individualist paper:
INDIVIDUALISM
The individualistic doctrine, or fashion, is now quite popular with the young snobs who frequent adult education centers.
In their sterile discussions, they hurl the names of more or less logical men at each other, such as Epictetus, Epicurus, Socrates, etc., recalling their virtue, their wisdom, their selflessness and the proverbial beauty of their cowardice.
Then come endless discussions, spiced with grand scientific terms, with which these gentlemen presume to influence more or less cultivated minds.
In their supernatural “Self,” they claim to find all the pleasures that current society does not provide them.
They are hardly difficult to please; it is true that there is no need to, and that their propagated conception would contribute in all its harmful grandeur to the indefinite prolongation of the current social order.
It is obvious that they are not dangerous and that our opposition, as rebels, must focus on bringing them back to the true, tangible facts in all their forms and freeing them from their delusional and old-fashioned views.
Camille Tiercin
l’anarchie 1 no. 13 (6 juillet 1905): 4.
There is a lot that is of at least marginal interest in these early issues, as well as a lot of documentation of the debates of the day, but there are certainly issues where the gems are pretty thinly scattered.
E. Armand appears, in a response to Anna Mahé on coeducation, in no. 30. — I’ll gather up the Armand contributions elsewhere.
No. 31 gives us a “conversation” on individualism, part of a series of imagined dialogues, from Lorulot. He’s far from my favorite of the individualists, but this is useful:
ANARCHIST CONVERSATIONS
Individualism
— I find it difficult to understand how you can reconcile the thesis of organization with that of individualism. The latter seems to me to be nothing more than a system of isolation, negating all grouping, all association.
— Hold on! Before judging my conception, you must at least understand it. It has no connection whatsoever with certain bizarre forms of individualism, the product of exaggerated egoism or profound indifference.
Individualism is the individual’s permanent and reasoned reaction to everything around them; it is the affirmation by each person of the existence of their “self” and the desire for its complete development.
By individual, I mean a whole, forming a particular organized being (animal or plant), which can be taken alone, considered as a unit among those of its species.
The fundamental error of almost all sociological schools has always been to consider society as a living whole and to neglect the units that compose it. It is certain that this (purely metaphysical) approach cannot yield any good results and that it is absolutely necessary to focus on individuals, to start with the unit and arrive at the whole. The essential chapter of sociology must be the individual, abstracted from any entity, because, as Buffon said: “In reality, there are only individuals. Genuses, orders and classes exist only in our imagination.”
That being said, I think that individualism is closely linked to anarchism.
Indeed, isn’t anarchy — (a-archia) “without command, without authority” — the most beautiful expression of individualism, which negates all dogma and all conventions imposed by the “majority,” “the family,” (the people), etc.? It seems impossible to call oneself an anarchist if one doesn’t fundamentally possess an individualistic spirit and character. This individualistic spirit is the adversary of the socialist spirit: a doctrine of personal energy and individual initiative, it opposes the thesis of regimentation, of delegation, of voting.
— But still, doesn’t individualism, based entirely on egoism, lead individuals to a very strange conception of life? How can one conceive of a social state where everyone is completely detached from their fellow human beings and in conflict with them?
— Individualism doesn’t necessarily imply an isolated life. The individual doesn’t leave society; on the contrary, they assert themselves within it and live their lives within it. This individual only enters into conflict with those who oppress them. The conscious individualist is ready to unite with others like themselves, without thereby relinquishing any part of their autonomy or faculties.
The idea that you may have regarding individualism stems from the misuse of this word. Certain social climbers, more or less dubious, have seized upon it, using it as a cover to pursue their ambitions and satisfy their fiercely mediocre bourgeois appetites. These people feign contempt for all action, all propaganda; they reject everything that doesn’t concern them, and as the philosopher said, “Their navel is the center of the universe.” Moreover, they adapt perfectly to current society and do not fight it at all. Others use the same pretext to speak of resignation, passivity, and to eulogize nebulous philosophers from antiquity. An Epictetus or a Marcus Aurelius becomes their god.
The anarchist individual observes that he is alive. He desires to continue living, intellectually and physically. To this end, he fights and struggles against all those who seek to oppress him or hinder his development. In the name of his egoism (the spirit of life and individual self-preservation), he reacts to his environment when that environment is hostile to him. He is ready to “cooperate” with it if that environment does not seek to crush his form, his “self.”
— Aren’t you afraid that this individualism, by seeking immediate gratification and rejecting all apostolic work, will hinder the spread of our propaganda?
— Quite the opposite will happen. By refusing all sacrifice in the name of the Cause, the Idea, by disdaining the attitude of martyrdom, etc., the individual does not abandon the realization of his personal integrity. He therefore seeks, in his own interest, to create individuals like himself, who will swell the embryo of anarchist society and assist him and his comrades in their work. To this end, he will increase the means of disseminating and propagating the theories he deems sound. This is the sole purpose of anarchism: to create individuals, men who will be, in their respective centers, agents of disintegration, as well as shapers of new unity.
It is necessary to change the individual in order to change the environment, to make the revolution within oneself, to work sincerely toward individual regeneration, to strive to become conscious. To be conscious is to act with the utmost reflection, to reason through all one’s actions, to never allow one’s self to be diminished by a passion, an inclination or a habit, to be able to live, consume and act without exaggeration, without exceeding one’s needs, without hindering the happiness and freedom of others.
Only individuals deeply imbued with this desire for mutual understanding, good reciprocal relations, and a regular and useful life can live anarchically.
— Yes, this conception is not the crushing individualism of some, and far from rejecting association and communism, it frees them from all fashionable sentimentality and takes these terms in their true sense.
— When we speak of our self, we mean ourselves and our comrades. We can therefore form our anarchist “family” right now. The materials exist; we simply need to gather and coordinate them.
We will try to determine in a future meeting what the logical attitude of an individualist anarchist should be under certain conditions and in the face of certain situations.
André Lorulot.
l’anarchie 1 no. 31 (9 novembre 1905): 3-4.
RIP Carp Combs.
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