Anarchist Authorship

From Ignited in Dark

Novatore, in their iconoclastic impulse, was writing to stir and exalt their spirit, to meander in their inner garden and herald its outer sunshine. They were not setting out to become an intellectual figure like Marx or Proudhon; their battles were on the fields and in the streets equally so as in the pages of Nichilismo, Iconoclasta!, Il Libertario, et al. Rather, Novatore was inciting a practical possibility of Stirner and Nietzsche’s thought. They were demonstrating a sovereign reality of force and passion which, as Novatore says, “…bursts beyond every dam and overflows beyond every boundary, stirring action on its way.” Novatore was a vagabond, a deserter, an illegalist, an agent of self-will through and through; they embodied not simply poetic anarchist mockery, but the entirety of the self-owned spirit.

Frans de Waal (1948-2024)

From Anarchist Writers

The Dutch-American primatologist and ethologist Frans de Waal died of stomach cancer on 14 March 2024. His research was of interest to anarchists for it centred on primate social behaviour, including conflict resolution, cooperation, inequity aversion and empathy. In other words, subjects which Peter Kropotkin pioneered in Mutual Aid and Ethics. Unusually, de Waal was well aware of Kropotkin’s work and mentioned it in his writings, noting repeatedly how Kropotkin “rightly noted that many animals survive not through struggle, but through mutual aid."

On the Clock

From Commonweal Magazine

Full title: On the Clock, Cyril Schäublin’s anarchist vision of quiet resistance

Given their similar spellings, a young student might be forgiven for confusing the words “anarchism” and “anachronism.” The concepts named by each term, on the other hand, are relatively easy to distinguish. But Unrest—a film based on Russian political philosopher Pyotr Kropotkin’s 1870s travels among the anarchist watchmakers of the Swiss Jura Mountains—mixes together anarchistic opposition to coercive social organization with a refusal of the dictates of time.

Black Flag: Anarchist Review Spring 2023 issue now out

The new issue of Black Flag: Anarchist Review is now available:
https://www.blackflag.org.uk

This issue includes articles on Anarchism and the General Strike, the London 1881 Congress and two key 1883 events – the Lyon show trial and the 9th of March unemployment demonstration which saw Louise Michel raise the black flag. We also discuss Albert Camus and his links with anarchism, the lessons of previous revolutions for anarchists with regards to the Ukraine war as well as an account of anarchism in Brazil between 1903 and 2013. And more…

Unrest: An Intriguingly Minimalist Chronicle of 19th-Century Anarchy

It’s hard to think of a better title than the one writer-director Cyril Schäublin came up with for his second feature, which chronicles the political fervor swelling beneath the surface of a quiet, picturesque industrial town in late-19th century Switzerland.

On interventionism

Considering No War But the Class War

The war in Ukraine has raised a sometimes heated discussion on one of socialism’s most potent slogans: No War But The Class War. The general political idea (deserters and mutineers having always existed), is that the working class should not fight and die for the schemes of the rich and the frothing delusions of nationalism. It appears in World War I, II, in the Falklands, in Iraq. It is shouted at rallies and printed on placards. It’s graffiti’d, leafletted and posted online.

Informal Conversation with French Anarchist René Berthier

from Cyber Dandy

Among the topics discussed: Recent Piece on Islamic Anarchism, Proudhon, Kropotkin, Tiqqun, Invisible Committee, Communization Theory, etc., Unions, Platformism, Especifismo, and Synthesist Anarchism, Post-Anarchism and much more!

The Legacy of Peter Kropotkin

via Autonomies

These words are part of Peter Kropotkin’s heritage. But he himself went through a sad episode: he became intoxicated by the nationalism of French and English culture, supposedly progressive and favourable to the next revolution in the Latin and Slavic countries, which weakened his analytical capacity.With incredible courage, in very fragile health, after forty years in exile, Kropotkin decided to return to Russia, already liberated from Tsarism in 1917, to end his life there. It was then that Lenin wanted to meet and manipulate Kropotkin. Or was it his attempt to do the opposite? We will see this strange situation on another occasion.

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