Working Translations

Proposal for an Anarchist Encyclopedia in 1895

The work of an Anarchist Encyclopedia appearing indispensable to some comrades, who think that such a document would serve a useful purpose, for every person could consult there the expressions, terms and subjects that constantly figure in the texts of all the writers, which escape for the moment those who know, and would instruct those who do not yet and and who desire to learn. […]

Working Translations

Le Rétif (Victor Serge), “To Be and to Appear” (1909)

We do not live for ourselves—we live for others. We suffer, we struggle and we die for the gallery, to astonish others, to wrest from them a cry of admiration or praise. To appear is the great, the unique concern for the men of this century.

For the vain glory of appearing, they renounce really living. And this is true in all the domains of their activity. […]

Working Translations

Elisée Reclus, “The Anarchist” (1902)

By definition, the anarchist is the free man, [1] the one who has no master. The ideas that he professes are indeed his own through reasoning. His will, springing from the understanding of things, focuses on a clearly defined aim; his acts are the direct realization of his individual intent. Alongside those who devoutly repeat the words of others or the traditional saying, who make their being bend and conform to the caprice of a powerful individual, or, what is still more grave, to the oscillations of the crowd, he alone is a man, he alone is conscious of his value in the face of all these spineless and inconsistent things that dare not live their own lives. […]

Working Translations

What is the Anarchist Entente? (1928)

Each tendency makes its own propaganda, each association functioning as it sees fit, each paper expounding its specific claims. No polemics between persons or tendencies. Neither shop competition nor struggles to monopolize. Neither absorption, nor fusion, nor confusion. To each its place its place in the sun, its tactics, its path and its pace, its achievements and its experiences, provided that it does not entail recourse to the State or to governmental sanctions. Peace among us and war to the archists. […]