Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Upton Sinclair, ed. (1878–1968). rn The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest. 1915.

Art After the Revolution
(From “Syndicalism and the Co-operative Commonwealth”)

Émile Pataud and Émile Pouget

(Two of the most prominent leaders of the revolutionary trade unions of France have in this story, published in 1912, portrayed the overthrow of the capitalist state by the method of the general strike, and the form of society which they anticipate from the “direct action” of the workers)

LIFE was now to take its revenge. The human being was no longer riveted to the chain of wages; his aim in life passed beyond the mere struggle for a living. Industry was no longer his master, but his servant. Freed from all hindrances, he would be able to develop without constraint.

And there was no need to fear that the level of art would be lowered as it became universalized. Far from this, it would gain in extent and depth. Its domain would be unlimited. It would enter into all production. It would not restrict itself to painting large canvasses, to sculpturing marble, to moulding bronze. There would be art in everything.

And we should no longer see great artists stifled by misery, lost in the quicksands of indifference, as was too often the case formerly.