Élisée Reclus

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Élisée Reclus.

Élisée Reclus (March 15, 1830–July 4, 1905) was a French geographer and anarchist. Also known as Jean Jacques Élisée Reclus.

He was born at Sainte-Foy-la-Grande (Gironde). He was the second son of a Protestant pastor, who had a family of fourteen children, several of whom acquired some celebrity either as men of letters, politicians or members of the learned professions.

His education, begun in Rhenish Prussia, was continued in the Protestant college of Montauban, and completed at the university of Berlin, where he followed a long course of geography under Karl Ritter.

Withdrawing from France in consequence of the events of December 1851, he spent the next six years (1852–1857) visiting the British Isles, the United States, Central America, and Colombia. On his return to Paris he contributed to the Revue des deux mondes, the Tour du monde and other periodicals a large number of articles embodying the results of his geographical work. Among other works at this period was an excellent short book, Histoire d’un ruisseau, in which he traces the development of a great river from source to mouth. In 1867–1868 he published La Terre; description des phénomènes de la vie du globe, in two volumes.

During the 1870 siege of Paris, Reclus shared in the aerostatic operations conducted by Félix Nadar, and also served in the National Guard, while as a member of the Association Nationale des Travailleurs he published in the Cri du Peuple a hostile manifesto against the government of Versailles in support of the Paris Commune of 1871.

Continuing to serve in the National Guard, now in open revolt, he was taken prisoner on April 5, and on November 16 sentenced to transportation for life; but, largely at the instance of influential deputations from England, the sentence was commuted in January 1872 to perpetual banishment.

Thereupon, after a short visit to Italy, he settled at Clarens, in Switzerland, where he resumed his literary labours, and, after producing the Histoire d’une montagne (a companion to Histoire d’un ruisseau), wrote nearly the whole of his great work, La Nouvelle Géographic universelle, la terre et les hommes, 19 vols (1875–1894). This is a stupendous compilation, profusely illustrated with maps, plans, and engravings, and was crowned with the gold medal of the Paris Geographical Society in 1892. An English edition appeared simultaneously, also in 19 vols. the first four by E. G. Ravenstein, the rest by A. H. Keane.

Extreme accuracy and brilliant exposition form the leading characteristics of all Reclus’s writings, which thus possess permanent literary and scientific value.

In 1882 Reclus initiated the Anti-Marriage Movement, in accordance with which he allowed his two daughters to marry without any civil or religious sanction whatever. This step caused no little embarrassment to many of his well-wishers, and was followed by government prosecutions, instituted in the High Court of Lyon, against the anarchists, members of the International Association, of which Reclus and the influential Anarchist Kropotkin were designated as the two chief organizers. Piotr(Peter) Kropotkin was arrested and condemned to five years’ imprisonment, but Reclus, being resident in Switzerland, escaped.

After 1892 he filled the chair of comparative geography in the university of Brussels, and contributed several important memoirs to French, German and English scientific journals. Among these may be mentioned:

"The Progress of Mankind" (Contemp. Rev., 1896)
"Attila de Gerando" (Rev. Géograph., 1898)
"A Great Globe" (Geograph. Journ., 1898)
"L’Extrême-Orient" (Bul. Antwerp Geo. Soc., 1898), a thoughtful study of the political geography of the Far East and its possible changes
"La Perse" (Bul. Soc. Neuchateloise, 1899)
"La Phénice et les Phéniciens" (ibid., 1900)
"La Chine et la diplomatie européenne" ("L'Humanité nouvelle" series, 1900)
"L'Enseignement de la géographie" (Instit. Geograph. de Bruxelles, No 5, 1901)

Shortly before his death Reclus had completed L'Homme et la terre, in which he set the crown on his previous greater works by considering man in his development relative to geographical environment.

Reclus died at Torhout, near Bruges.

[edit] See also

Anarchism in France
His brother, Onésime Reclus, also a geographer, coined the term "Francophonie" to designate a possible community of French-speaking people.

[edit] Further reading

Fleming, Marie, The Geography of Freedom: the Odyssey of Élisée Reclus, Montréal [etc.]: Black Rose Books, 1988

Dunbar, Gary S., "Elisée Reclus; A Historian of Nature", Archon Books, Hamden, Connecticut, USA, 1978
Ishill, Joseph, Élisée and Élie Reclus, The Oriole Press, Berkeley Heights, New Jersey, USA, 1927
Cahiers Pensée et Action, Élisée Reclus, savant et anarchiste, Paris Bruxelles, 1956
Hélène Sarrazin, Élisée Reclus ou la passion du monde, La Découverte, Paris, 1985
Joël Cornuault, Élisée Reclus, géographe et poète, fédérop, Eglise-Neuve d'Issac, 1995
Roger Gonot, Élisée Reclus, Prophète de l'idéal anarchiste, Covedi, 1996
Joël Cornuault, Élisée Reclus, étonnant géographe, Fanlac, Périgueux, 1999
Crestian Lamaison, Élisée Reclus, l'Orthésien qui écrivait la Terre, Orthez Cité du Livre, 2005
Joël Cornuault, Élisée Reclus et les Fleurs Sauvages, Librairie La Brèche, Bergerac, 2005
Joël Cornuault, Les Cahiers Élisée Reclus, Librairie La Brèche, Bergerac, 1996 – 2006
Philippe Pelletier, la géographie innovante d'Élisée Reclus, les Amis de Ste Foy et sa région, n°86, 2005
An Anarchist on Anarchy by Elisee Reclus (1884) [1]