Georges Sorel

Biography

Born from a father negotiating out of oils and aerated waters, whose businesses périclitèrent, and from a very pious mother, it enters to the Polytechnic school (X1865 Promotion), then with the Ponts and Chaussées. At 45 years, he resigns of his post of chief engineer with Perpignan and settles with Paris, then in the Boulogne-on-Seine with Marie David, former worker, quasi illiterate, whom he will never marry because, perhaps, of the opposition of his/her mother. After its death in 1897, it dedicates its Réflexions to him on violence , “this book very inspired of its spirit”.

Starting from second half of the years 1880, it publishes studies in various fields (meteorology, hydrology, architecture, physics, political and religious history, philosophy). It then appears influenced by the physics of Aristote and by the historical studies of Hippolyte Taine and Ernest Renan. In 1893, he declares his engagement socialist and Marxist. He is based on his readings of Proudhon, of Karl Marx, Giambattista Vico, then of Henri Bergson, of which he follows the courses to the Collège de France; later, he discovers the pragmatism of William James. He maintains a dense correspondence with the Italian philosopher Benedetto Croce and with the sociologist Vilfredo Pareto. After having collaborated in the first French Marxist reviews, the new Era and To become to It social , it takes part at the beginning of the XXe century with the debate on the crisis of the Marxism by taking the party of Eduard Bernstein against Karl Kautsky and Antonio Labriola. He declares himself favorable to the revision of the lawsuit of Dreyfus. While collaborating in the socialist Movement of Hubert Lagardelle, it contributes about 1905 to the theoretical emergence of the revolutionary Syndicalisme. In 1906, it publishes its most famous text there, the Réflexions on violence which will be followed by the Illusions of progress .

Disappointed by the evolution of this current, it will approach one moment, in 1909-1910, of the monarchists of Charles Maurras, but without dividing of it the Nationalisme and the political aiming. He flirte then with the traditionalists of the French Action and collaborates of 1911 to 1913 in the review the Independence which he founds with Jean Variot, but that he will leave because of the nationalism which is expressed there.

Savagely opposed to the Sacred union of 1914, it condemns the war and greets the advent of the Russian Révolution, by judging Lénine like “the largest theorist whom socialism had since Marx”. Very hostile with Gabriele D' Annunzio which undertakes to conquer Fiume, it does not show more sympathy to the rise of Fascism.

At the same time antidemocratic and revolutionary, the thought of Sorel influenced many thinkers and politicians of the 20th century, as well of right-hand side as of left. Among them, people of French Action, like Pierre Lasserre, or the Italian Communist Antonio Gramsci. Benito Mussolini, arrived at the capacity, will be claimed some. Sorel is known, abroad than in France, for its interpretation original of the Marxism, fundamentally anti-determinist and politically anti-étatiste and anti-jacobine, based on the direct action of the trade unions, the involving role of the myth, in particular that of the General strike, and on the anti-integrating function of violence.

He is the cousin of the historian Albert Sorel.

Works

the Lawsuit of Socrate, Examen criticizes socratic theses , Paris, Alcan, 1889
Essai on the philosophy of Proudhon (1st ED. 1892), Paris, Stalker Editor, 2007
D' Aristote with Marx (the Old one and new metaphysics) (1st ED. 1894), Paris, Marcel River, 1935
Study on Vico (1st ED. 1896), begun again in Study on Vico and other writings Paris, Champion, 2007.
socialist Future of the trade unions (1st ED. 1898), Paris, Jacques, 1901
Ruin of the ancient world, Design materialist of the history (1st ED. s.d., 2nd ED. 1925), 3rd ED. Paris, Marcel River, 1933
Saggi di critica LED marxismo , Palermo, Sandron, 1903, retranslated in Tests of critic of the Marxism. Works I , Patrick Gaud (ED.), Paris, Harmattan, 2007.
Introduction to the modern economy (1st ED. 1903), Paris, Marcel River, 1922
the historical System of Renan , Paris, G. Jacques, 1906
Insegnamenti sociali dell' economia contemporanea. Degenerazione capitalista E degenerazione socialista , Palermo, Sandron, 1907
Reflections on violence , Paris, Pages free, 1908
Decomposition of the Marxism (1st ED. 1908), Paris, Marcel River, 1910
Illusions of progress , Paris, Marcel River, 1908
the Revolution dreyfusienne (1st ED. 1909), Paris, Marcel River, 1911
Materials of a theory of the proletariat (1st ED. 1919), Paris, Marcel River, 1921
Of the Utility of pragmatism , Paris, Marcel River, 1921
Letters with Paul Delesalle, 1914-1921 , Paris, Grasset, 1947
Lettere has a amico of Italia , Bologna, Capelli, 1963
the Decomposition of the Marxism , anthology published by Th. Paquot, Paris, PUF, 1982.

Many new texts of Sorel were published in the review Cahiers Georges Sorel , then Mil nine hundred . The Tables of this review, published since 1983, are consultable on line on the site of the review

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