The Arcades Project - Operi

promote unceasingly in the face of feudal and hierarchical powers, and that we be
clear about the fact that the movement itself comprehends mystical elements as
well, although of an entirely different sort. It is even more important, naturally,
not to confuse these mystical elements, which pertain to corporality, with relig­
ious elements. [a1 ,2]
Episode of the February Hevolution. On the twenty-third, at eleven o clock in the
evening, a fusillade on the Boulevard des Capucines: twenty-three dead. "The
corpses are immediately paraded through the streets in a masterly, romantic mise
en scene. 'Midnight is about to sound. The boulevards arc still faintly lighted by
the fading illumination [the celebratory illumination occasioned by the retreat of
Guizot]. The doors and windows of the houses and shops are shut, everyone
having returned home with heavy hearts . ... All of a sudden. a muffled rumbling
is heard on the paving stones, and some windows are cautiously opened . ... In a
eart drawn by a white horse, with a bare-armed worker holding the reins, five
cadavers are arranged in horrible symmetry. Standing on the shaft is a child of the
working class, sallow of complexion, a fixed and ardent look upon his face, his arm
extended, nearly immobile, as though to represent the Genius of Vengeance; leaning
backward, this boy lights up, with the beams of his torch, the body of a young
woman whose livid neck and hosom are stained with a long trail of blood. From
time to time anot.her worker, posit.ioned behind the cart, raises this lifeless body
wit.h a muscular arm and-his torch all the while emitting sparks and flakes of
fire-cast.s his savage gaze over the crowd, shouting, "'Vengeance! Vengeance!
They are slaught.ering the peopleP' "To Arms!" respond some voices; and
t.he corpse falls back into the hottom of the cart, which continues on its way. '"
(Daniel Stern). Duhech and d'Espezel, Histaire de Paris (Paris, 1926), p. 396.
o Lighting 0 [a1,3]
The masses of workers mobilized by Haussmann were compared-unfavorablyto
those ineorporated in the nat.ional workshops of 1848. 0 Haussmann 0 [a1,4]
"The favorite readings of the working-class tailor are the histories of the Revolution
of 1789. He likes it when t.hese texts develop the idea t.hat this revolution was a
good thing, and that it improved the condition of the working class. He is inspired
by the aura of drama lent to men and events by several famous authors . ... Not
perceiving that the principal eause of his social inferiority lies within himself, he
likes to think that these men are the models for those who, in forging a new
progress, will preserve him from all kinds of calamities." F. Le Play, Les Onvriers
cnropeens , p. 277. [al,5]
"Street warfare today has its own technique; it was perfected, after the armed
takeover of Munich , in a curious little confidential work published with
great secrecy hy the government in Berlin. One no longer advances t.hrough the
streets; they are left empty. A pat.h is opened within the int.eriors of houses, hy