Creative destruction! Bakunin’s most infamous speech was given at a great banquet in Paris to commemorate that first Polish uprising, and for giving the speech Bakunin was deported from France at the request of the Russian ambassador.
On February 4th, 1848 his expulsion gave rise to a strongly supported interpellation in the Chamber of Deputies, to which Guizot and Duchatel returned lame and conflicting replies . . . French workers and intellectuals then stepped up their campaign of leaflets and revolutionary banquets! When they announced a Paris march and banquet for 22 February 1848, Guizot and the king decided that a show of strength was needed, and forbade the public gatherings. Then the organizers declared they would hold the banquet regardless of the government’s order, people gathered in the streets to support them. Support turned to active protest as the police clashed with the demonstrators. They had dispersed similar crowds before with little consequence, but this time was different. . . The revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the springtime of the peoples or the springtime of nations, were a series of revolutions throughout Europe over the course of more than one year, from 1848 to 1849. It remains the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history to date. Contemporaneously the first openly fascist proclamations were made by German national socialists ( Manifesto Communist Party ) No good deed . . . But darling, Spring 1848: Astonishing success! The world was astonished in spring 1848 when revolutions appeared in so many places and seemed on the verge of success everywhere. Agitators who had been exiled by the old governments rushed home to seize the moment. In France, the monarchy was once again overthrown and replaced by a republic. Bakunin walked over the border and reached Paris as soon as the disrupted railway system would allow him. He lodged among the working-class National Guard who occupied the barracks in the rue Tournon, and spent his days and a large part of his nights in a fever of excitement and activity. I breathed through all my senses and through all my pores the intoxication of the revolutionary atmosphere [ he recollected later in the forced tranquillity of a prison cell]. It was a holiday without beginning and without end. I saw everyone and I saw no one, for each individual was lost in the same innumerable and wandering crowd. I spoke to all I met without remembering either my own words or those of others, for my attention was absorbed at every step by new events and objects and by unexpected news. . . " It was interesting to walk the little roads and paths through the forest, to touch the mighty old trees that witnessed the childhoods of all eleven of the Bakunin siblings in the 19th century, to imagine young Mikhail walking here as well, conversing with his sisters and friends. It makes one reflect on how environments and circumstances can influence our lives. Who would ever have imagined! https://www.anarchistnews.org/content/virtual-tour-priamukhino
