Louise MICHEL – Autographed letter signed to comrade Alexandre Roy.  

Louise MICHEL (1830.1905)

Autographed letter signed to comrade Alexandre Roy.  

Four quarto pages. Co-written (on the 4th ^sheet ) with Achille Vauvelle.

Autographed envelope. London, April 1 ^, 1901

"You'll see that I'll be quite heroic too..."

Long letter from Louise Michel (completed by Achille Vauvelle) about poetry and English and French literature.

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Louise Michel promises to return to Roy his copy of a treatise on poetry, with a few pages added “ to prove that the measures banned from the treatise are as beautiful as those accepted in it ” and gives some examples of what can be tolerated in the number of versified feet.

Then she answers several questions from Roy about Madame Bras, whom she mentions in her Memoirs , and about her aunt. She then gives her opinion on different methods for learning English, the best being " the one that most integrates into the life of the student ," citing those of Theodore Robertson, Sanderson, and François Gouin, before explaining her own teaching method for native English speakers: " So we take a somewhat exciting work. Last year we had Tolstoy's Resurrection and Zola's Fertility translated into English, which we read in French. It was very good. This year we proceed in dozens of lessons . [...] We take the twelve chapters of Tolstoy's Ivan the Mad, which we translate in the same way, adding a short summary read aloud in French about the reading or a judgment on the work ."

She sometimes undertakes a word-for-word translation, particularly of poems, also drawing on works translated into English, such as Travail , or on readings in French, such as Le Père Goriot . She specifies that she plans to publish her method in England, after giving news of the Russian revolutionary Goworouchine, known as Gregorieff: “ No, poor Gregorieff is not out of poverty. His Russian lessons are advertised every two or three days in L'Intransigeant, but he's out of luck .”

Achille Vauvelle adds to this letter, thanking Alexandre Roy for sending a book on color photography, and expressing his doubts about the use of colors that only exist through contrast: “ I fear harsh colors and the lack of harmony in the final result. ”