LOUISE MICHEL (Rebel Lit)

Louise Michel was the incendiary French leader of the 1871 Paris Commune. An anarchist and an irrepressible rebel, she spent much of her life on the run from police, in jail, or in danger of being locked away in mental asylums, as was the fate of so many feisty or defiant women. Known as "The Red Virgin," Louise was a great character from one of the greatest popular rebellions in history.

Here is Michel&;s own story, along with commentaries about her by Emma Goldman, Bertolt Brecht, Sheila Rowbotham, Howard Zinn, and her contemporaries Victor Hugo and Karl Marx. This is the third woman in the "Rebel Lives" series.

Louise Michel was an inspiring woman leader when the population of Paris rose up in 1871 to establish a short-lived workers' government. After the Commune was crushed, Michel, known throughout Europe as "The Red Virgin," was captured, jailed and deported to the South Pacific. She supported the French colonies' struggles for independence, and was spied on and repeatedly arrested by police forces across Europe until her death. She maintained a lifetime friendship with French writer and poet Victor Hugo, along with many other European artists. Nic Maclellan is the author of After Moruroa: France in the South Pacific. He is a world authority on French colonialism and has translated much of this book, making parts of Michel's work available in English for the first time.