25. Paris on the eve of death¶
Core Argument¶
Here, in the chapter "Paris on the Eve of Death," Lissagaray offers a final, impassioned portrait of the Commune before its destruction, a deliberate counter-narrative to the "brigand" propaganda of Versailles. The core argument is that Paris, in its last days, was not a den of chaos and criminality but a luminous, disciplined, and heroic city, embodying the true spirit of revolution. The chapter is structured as a guided tour for a timid provincial friend, a device that allows Lissagaray to systematically refute every calumny.
Key claims are supported by vivid, on-the-ground evidence. The city’s press is shown as vibrant and diverse, not bloodthirsty: journals like Le Cri du Peuple sell 100,000 copies, yet Lissagaray challenges the reader to find "one appeal to murder, to pillage, a single cruel line" in them, contrasting this with Versaillese papers demanding "fusillades en masse." The Commune’s respect for culture is demonstrated by the open Louvre and the Academy of Sciences holding its Monday sittings, directly rebutting the lie that the Commune was selling national collections. The discipline and humanity of the Communards are illustrated through the military prison, where Versailles soldiers are treated as comrades, and through the testimony of Dr. Demarquay, a political opponent, who attests to the extraordinary calm and courage of the wounded. The chapter’s most potent polemic is against Thiers, whose own 1848 speech denouncing the bombardment of Palermo by its own government is reproduced on a poster, a bitter irony as Paris endures its fortieth day of bombardment.
The historical context is the final week of the Commune, with the narrative moving from the bustling boulevards to the deadly zone of the Porte-Maillot. Lissagaray draws on the revolutionary tradition of 1793, noting that Paris has not witnessed such "virile spectacles" since that year. The chapter is a sustained polemic against the Versaillese government and its bourgeois press. It defends the Commune’s use of foreign fighters, specifically General Dombrowski, by framing the struggle as "the revolution of all proletarians" and indicting French governments for betraying Poland. The final, rhetorical address to the provinces is a call to arms: if Paris dies, who will continue the Revolution? The chapter concludes by inverting the accusation of barbarism, declaring that the blood of the people will enrich the revolutionary field, and the idea of Paris will become an "inexorable firebrand."