Mathieu's Reviews > The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic

The Many-Headed Hydra by Peter Linebaugh
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The Many-Headed Hydra is a dense, complex and truly insightful book about what being a commoner, a proletarian, a slave meant from the early 16th to the early 19th century. It also a amazing history of these exploited people who were revolutionaries. Linebaugh and Rediker bring these forgotten struggles back to life, which is much-needed in our times since communism has reduced all these struggles to a single view of classes and since racialism has divided blacks and whites and since nationalism has divided the people into nations.

As capitalism, which was the impetus behind the exploitation and the invention of this proletariat, is crumbling before our very eyes, this book is a must-read for anyone trying to think what may lie beyond this tyrannical system.
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Reading Progress

August 6, 2011 – Shelved
August 10, 2011 – Shelved as: history
November 19, 2011 – Started Reading
November 19, 2011 –
page 13
2.9% "Et alors que je viens de finir d'écrire sur "Lost" et comment un naufrage devient une apologie de la "modernité réactionnaire," ici un naufrage devient la possibilité d'un collectif égalitaire, qu'elle que soit l'origine sociale ou raciale. Ca fait du bien!"
November 23, 2011 –
page 49
10.94%
December 3, 2011 –
page 131
29.24%
December 11, 2011 –
page 143
31.92%
January 4, 2012 –
page 154
34.38%
January 18, 2012 –
page 214
47.77% "Un chapitre intéressant sur l'insurrection ratée à New York en 1741, mais moins pénétrant. On passe maintenant à la Révolution américaine..."
January 28, 2012 –
page 252
56.25% "Le chapitre sur le rôle du "motley crew" (esclaves, marins, pauvres) dans la Révolution américaine était intéressant, notamment leur refoulement par la contre-révolution et même par les patriotes. La fin du chapitre laisse entrevoir des perspectives passionnantes mais les auteurs ne développent pas. Dommage."
February 4, 2012 –
page 327
72.99% "Un chapitre intriguant sur "The Conspiracy of Edward and Catherine Despard" et un autre sur Robert Wedderburn. Néanmoins, à chaque fois, une impression d'inachevé."
February 7, 2012 – Finished Reading

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