Paris Commune

Eu não sabia ou não havia me dado conta que o movimento da Comuna de Paris aconteceu simultaneamente com a Guerra Franco-Prussiana e serviu de inspiração para K. Marx. Interessante também a reação Americana (que perdura) ao fenômeno...

Today's selection -- from Death in the Haymarket by James Green. In the cataclysmic Franco-Prussian War or 1870 -- Bismarck's war -- the French Army surrendered to the Germans. But the citizens of Paris refused to surrender, and turned against their own French generals as a result, bringing about a bloody civil war fought within the walls of Paris. The citizen leaders that emerged became known as the Paris Commune, and though they ultimately capitulated, they served as inspiration to the nascent communist movement (Karl Marx's Das Kapital had been published in 1867) for decades to come. Americans in particular were fascinated and ultimately horrified, especially given the labor strife that was beginning to emerge in America, and the event was a harbinger of the anti-communist fears that continue even to this day: "All during the late summer of 1870, ... [American] readers ... intently followed news of the Franco-Prussian War: first the stunning news of the French army's defeat at Sedan, and then the capture of Napoleon III and the fall of his empire. .../.../