DownloadThe Portobello Bookshop Gift Guide 2024

The History of the Paris Commune of 1871

Prosper-Olivier Lissagaray author Eric Hazan author Eleanor Marx translator

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Verso Books

Published:21st Aug '12

Should be back in stock very soon

The History of the Paris Commune of 1871 cover

The classic history of the Paris Commune

In 1871, the working class of Paris, incensed by their lack of political power and tired of being exploited, seized control of the capital. This book is the outstanding history of the Commune, theheroic battles fought in its defence, and the bloody massacre that ended the uprising. Its author, Lissagaray, was a young journalist who not only saw the events recounted here first-hand, but fought for the Commune on the barricades. He spent the next twenty-five years researching and writing this history, which refutes the slanders levelled at the Communards by the ruling classes and is a vivid and valuable study in urban political revolution, one that retains its power to inspire to this day.

This revised edition, translated by Eleanor Marx, includes a foreword by the writer and publisher Eric Hazan.

Lissagaray relives the Commune with all the bitterness of a man who could see the tragedy unfold, even as he played his part, dutifully, to the end. -- Paul Mason, economics editor of the BBC’s Newsnight and author of Why It’s Kicking Off Everywhere
Prosper-Olivier Lissigaray, the Paris Commune's greatest historian, a rank-and-file participant in the events, produced a work of rare quality, a political history matched by few others. The tone of the book is fierce, passionate, angry and uncompromising. Its only equivalent is the poetry of Rimbaud. -- Tariq Ali

ISBN: 9781844677764

Dimensions: 236mm x 152mm x 33mm

Weight: 726g

464 pages