#WORLD #WORLDWIDE #FRANCE #ANARCHISM #News #Journal #Update - (en) France, UCL AL #329 - Culture, Read: Jules Vallès, "Memories of a poor student" (ca, de, it, fr, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 This book published in 2015 by Libertalia editions presents a story that weaves a

deep proximity to the revolutionary, despite the passage of time. Written in
1883, at the end of Jules Vallès' life, it is disconcertingly topical and
familiar. ---- Revisiting the neighborhoods of his youth and observing the change
in a city can only make the author nostalgic. The freshness of the words he uses
to describe his refusal to succeed, the respect he has for manual trades and the
contempt vis-à-vis the path traced by his father in the study of literature leave
a strong taste of complicity. How many children experience family pressure in
addition to social pressure to succeed at school? The scene of his mother begging
him to pass the exam imposed on him by his father, to then do what he wants,
gives the feeling of an eternal repetition of the human condition.

What to think of his disappointment at seeing the mind-numbing state of his
"brothers of the youth of the Schools" whom he finds in Paris ? Between drinking
and noise, his mind did not adhere to the atmosphere dictated by so much
"vulgarity" among Parisian students. There are still immigrants from the
interior, as the Auvergnat was, or from the outside, freshly landed in a country
of famous grandeur who, by too many idealizing readings, do not find their
projections. in the population and the much fantasized territory.

Vallès also makes us laugh a lot with his humor, the story of his pranks, his
self-mockery and the liveliness of his rage as an eternal rebel. The only
significant problem: the misogyny of certain remarks makes it difficult to read.
When more than a century and a half later, there is still so much to do,
lecturing the dead is a futile task.

As Bernard Lecache, responsible for the first edition of the book in the 1930s,
says: "His work defies time and does not fear oblivion". Ah! damn no!

Marouane (UCL Naoned)

Jules Vallès, Memories of a poor student, Libertalia, 2015, 170 pages, 10 euros.

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Lire-Jules-Valles-Souvenirs-d-un-etudiant-pauvre
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