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Petr Lavrov

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

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Petr Lavrovich Lavrov, a recognized leader of Russian Populism (Narodnichestvo), not only witnessed on the spot the events preceding and following March 18, 1871, he also analyzed them in a monograph and often reverted to them in his writings and speeches. He arrived in Paris on March 13, 1870, after having escaped from one of the northern areas of his native country, where he was deported to by the Russian authorities. He was 47 years old and enjoyed the well earned name of an able homme de lettres and defender of causes dear to the radical intelligentsia. Moreover, in a study called Historical Letters (1868–1869), composed in the solitude of his deportation, he succeeded in formulating the aspirations of the Russian revolutionary youth.

Type
Echos: I Ideologues
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1972

References

page 441 note 1 See Lavrov, P. L.: Sbornik statei, Izdanie “Kolos”, Petersburg 1922.Google Scholar

page 441 note 2 P. Lavrov, 18 marta 1871 goda, Geneva 1880.

page 441 note 3 See, e.g., the editorial in the newspaper Vpered, London, No 5 of March 15/3, 1875; Lavrov,], [P. “Gosudarstvennyi element v budushchem obshchestve”, in: Vpered, Vol. IV, Part 1, London 1876, pp. 9192;Google ScholarKalendar', Narodnoi Voli, Geneva 1883, pp. 9899Google Scholar; Vestnik Narodnoi Voli, Geneva 1883, No 1, pp. 1–4 and 1886, No 5, Section 2, p. 37; Lavrov, P., Cherez vosem' let. 1871–1879–1887, Geneva 1900.Google Scholar

page 441 note 4 Kudrin, N. [Rusanov, N. S.], “P. L. Lavrov”, in: Byloe, St Petersburg 1907, No 2 (14), p. 264.Google Scholar

page 441 note 5 See, e.g., Vitiazev, P., in “Vpered!” Sbornik statei, posviashchennykh pamiati Petra Lavrovicha Lavrova, Petrograd-Moscow [1920], p. 5Google Scholar, and Kuniskii, D., Russkoe obshchestvo i Parizhskaia Kommuna, Moscow 1962, p. 76.Google Scholar

page 441 note 6 This autobiography appeared first in a mimeographed form (a copy is in possession of the Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis, Amsterdam); then it was published in Vestnik Evropy, St Petersburg 1910, Nos 10 and 11, and, later on, reproduced in Lavrov, P. L., Izbrannye sochineniia na sotsial'no-politicheskie temy v vos'mi tomakh, prepared for publication by Knizhnik-Vetrov, I. S., Vol. I (18571871), Moscow 1934, pp. 77–17.Google Scholar

page 442 note 1 Lavrov, , Izbrannye sochineniia, Vol. I, p. 83.Google Scholar

page 442 note 2 To the best of my knowledge, this article has until now remained completely unknown to researchers. I. S. Knizhnik-Vetrov, who called attention to the two correspondences on the Commune written by Lavrov for L'Internationale on March 21 and 28, only hinted at “something else” printed by Lavrov in L'Internationale prior to these reports (Izbrannye sochineniia, pp. 65 and 489). I ascribe the contribution in question to Lavrov because it was signed L. Pierre, a pseudonym used by Lavrov, and because it is replete with expressions typical for Lavrov's writings in the seventies, e.g., “L'Internationale – un état sans territoire”, “guerre au monopole”, “l'état tel qu'il est”. Moreover, it was characteristic of Lavrov's mentality to deal with the question how to solve personal conflicts among the membership of the International. See also the documents published by B. S. Itenberg in Istoriia SSSR, 1971, No 2, pp. 757ndash;107. These documents, which reached me after completion of the present article, bear witness to the Socialist faith of Lavrov prior to the Commune.

page 442 note 3 Sazhin, M. P., Vospominaniia 1860–1880, Moscow 1925, pp. 30, 31 and 35.Google Scholar

page 442 note 4 Letters written by Lavrov to G. Lopatin in 1870 of May 5 and August 5 and 12. These letters form a part of a large collection of more than 300 of Lavrov's letters to Lopatin, preserved at the IISG. The collection is now being prepared for publication in the framework of the Russian Series on Social History sponsored by the Institute and published by the D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland.

page 442 note 5 Lavrov's letter to G. Lopatin of September 12, 1870.

page 442 note 6 18 marta 1871 goda, pp. 6–7.

page 443 note 1 See Document II.

page 443 note 2 See “Correspondance de Paris” (March 28), in: L'Internationale, April 2, 1871.

page 443 note 3 Izbrannye sochineniia, Vol. I, p. 83.

page 443 note 4 18 marta 1871 goda, pp. 63–64.

page 443 note 5 On Eugène Hins see Devreese, D. E., “Militanten rond de Eerste Internationale in België, 1860–1880”, unpublished master thesis, University of Ghent, academic year 19671968, Vol. III, pp. 302326.Google Scholar

page 443 note 6 See Lucien Descaves, “Une rectification”, in: Ouvrière, La Vie. Revue Syndi-caliste Bi-Mensuelle, Paris 1913, No 8990, pp. 688689.Google Scholar It was Mr Tristan Haan who drew my attention to this piece by Descaves and thus contributed toward identifying the person of M-lle Marie referred to by Lavrov in Document I.

page 443 note 7 Izbrannye sochineniia, p. 83.

page 444 note 1 18 marta 1871 goda, p. 205.

page 444 note 2 See Document III.

page 444 note 3 See Lavrov's letter to Miss E. A. Shtakenshneider of February 16, 1872, in: Golos Minuvshego, Petrograd 1916, No 9, p. 117.

page 444 note 4 Lavrov did include a mild criticism of the Commune in the first two programs of Vpered. In both these documents he pointed out, in almost identical terms, that a communal autonomy and a federal structure of a state do not represent in themselves the realization of Socialist goals (see “Vpered!” 1873–1877, Dordrecht 1970, Vol. II, pp. 120 and 138). He dropped this observation probably because he recognized that the whole controversy on federalism versus centralism did not touch the essentials of the Commune (see P. Lavrov, “Zadachi sotsialisma”, in: Vestnik Narodnoi Voli, Geneva 1883, No 1, p. 4, and Iu. O. Martov, Mirovoi bol'shevism, Berlin 1923, pp. 81–84).

page 445 note 1 18 marta 1871 goda, p. 40.

page 445 note 2 Ibidem, p. 23.

page 445 note 3 Ibidem, pp. 38–39.

page 445 note 4 Ibidem, p. 167.

page 445 note 5 Klaus Meschkat is mistaken when he writes in his book Die Pariser Kommune von 1871 im Spiegel der sowjetischen Geschichtsschreibung, Berlin 1965, p. 58: “Der Gedanke der Einheit von ökonomischer und politischer Umwälzung, die unter der Fübrung einer bewusst handelnden Partei verwirklicht werden kann, bringt Lavrov in die Nähe der politischen Theorien des Marxismus.” Russian Marxism emerged as a theory which contested the idea of simultaneity of political and socialist revolution in Russia, and developed the conception of a two-stage revolution. This conception had been shared until about 1917 by all Russian Social-Democrats by the Mensheviks as well as by the Bol'sheviks.

page 446 note 1 Vitiazev, P., in Materialy dlia biografii P. L. Lavrova, Petrograd 1921, p. 16.Google Scholar

page 446 note 2 Ivanov, B. [Nicolaevsky, B. I.], in Katorga i ssylka, 1931, No 1 (74), p. 74.Google Scholar

page 446 note 3 See Lavrov, P., “Vzgliad na proshedshee i nastoiashchee russkogo sotsializma”, in: Kalendar' Narodnoi Voli, Geneva 1883, pp. 81119.Google Scholar

page 446 note 4 Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Werke, Vol. 35, Berlin 1967, p. 160, letter to Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis, February 22, 1881.

page 447 note 1 Vestnik Narodnoi Voli, Geneva 1886, No 5, Part 2, p. 37.

page 447 note 2 Gosudarstvennyi element, p. 196.

page 447 note 3 Ibidem, p. 103.

page 448 note 1 Ibidem, p. 104.

page 449 note 1 Ibidem, pp. 115–116.

page 449 note 2 Ibidem, pp. 119–120; here Lavrov decidedly did not think in terms of general franchise.

page 449 note 3 Ibidem, pp. 121–123 and 125–126.

page 449 note 4 Ibidem, pp. 142–143.

page 450 note 1 Co-operative restaurant established by Varlin (see Ouvrière, La Vie. Revue Syndicaliste Bi-Mensuelle, Paris 1913, No 87, pp. 528529).Google Scholar

page 450 note 2 Marie Iatskevich, wife of Eugène Hins (see above, p. 443, notes 5-6).

page 454 note 1 Le Polonais Jaroslav Dombrowski, qui avait pris part au soulèvement polonais de 1865. Tué pendant l'assaut de Paris par l'armée versaillaise. [Footnote in Golos Minuvshego]

page 454 note 2 Probablement Rossel, dont il est question plus bas. [Footnote in Golos Minuvshego]