The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest / The writings of philosophers, poets, novelists, social reformers, and others who have voiced the struggle against social injustice; selected from twenty-five languages; covering a period of five thousand years

by Unknown

Art After the Revolution

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

By Émile Pataud and Émile Pouget

(See page [857])

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.