The Conquest of Bread

by Pyotr Kropotkin

(and we shall see how the conception of the necessaries of life can be so extended as to include luxuries),

mercantile production

The capitalist, profiting by the revolution effected in industry by steam, by the sudden development of chemistry and machinery, and by other inventions of our century, has worked in his own interest to increase the yield of human[Pg 88] labour, and in a great measure he has succeeded so far. But to attribute other duties to him would be unreasonable.

Oho, rather generous of Kropotkin to ascribe any value whatsoever to filthy capitalists.

It is always this minority that is pointed out to us with pride.

This is not merely accidental, it is a necessity of the capitalist system.

simple surplus not consumed by each generation;

for, that a surplus-value should exist, means that men, women and children are compelled by hunger to sell their labour for a small part of what this labour produces, and still more so, of what their labour is capable of producing:

four or five hours a day would suffice,

less than 6 half-days' work could procure bread, meat, vegetables, and even luxurious fruit for a whole family.

Need to know how he came by this figure

it follows that 28 to 36 half-days' work a year would provide well-furnished, healthy quarters, with all necessary comfort for a family.

See previous note

profits realized by a swarm of middlemen cannot be estimated.

men and women

Woke socialist from the Edwardian era

There remain still 150 half-days' work which could be made use of for other necessaries of life—wine, sugar, coffee, tea, furniture, transport, etc., etc.

real producers

scores of useless servants,

it is precisely these trifles that break the monotony of existence and make it agreeable.

And as all men do not and cannot resemble one another

The thesis of the "Grey Communist Hellhole" imagery

"In your communal stores you may perhaps have bread for all," he says to us, "but you will not have beautiful pictures, optical instruments, luxurious furniture, artistic jewelry—in short, the many things that minister to the infinite [Pg 97]variety of human tastes. And you suppress the possibility of obtaining anything besides the bread and meat which the commune can offer to all, and the drab linen in which all your lady citizens will be dressed."

The arguments really haven't changed in over a century have they?

American deserts,

Mormons?

the strength of Anarchy lies precisely in that that it understands all human faculties and all passions, and ignores none,

alternating manual with intellectual work,

when all will have to work with their hands,

Even old folk?

the yoke of the State, of Capital, and of the bourgeois mediocrity

But…but…socialism is when the govt does stuff and the more it does the socialister it gets (Carl Marks, 2018)…

Let us remember how the Academy of Sciences of France repudiated Darwin, how the Academy of St. Petersburg treated Mendeléeff with contempt, and how the Royal Society of London refused to publish Joule's paper, in which he determined the mechanical equivalent of heat, finding it "unscientific."

Moreover, they carefully hide their inventions from each other, as they are hampered by patents and Capitalism

You must have seen a sunset when returning from work. You must have been a peasant among peasants to keep the splendour of it in your eye. You must have been at sea with fishermen at all hours of the day and night, have fished yourself, struggled with the waves, faced the storm, and after rough work experienced the joy of hauling a heavy net, or the disappointment of seeing it empty, to understand the poetry of fishing. You must have spent time in a factory, known the fatigues and the joys of creative work, forged metals by the vivid light of a blast furnace, have felt the life in a machine, to understand the power of man and to express it in a work of art. You must, in fact, be permeated with popular feelings, to describe them.

This entire para. is simply a reiteration of the popular misconception that an artist can be inspired, solely, by what he has personally experienced.