Revolution as Beginning and Liberation. Georg Forster and Frantz Fanon – a Cross-Reading

Abstract

The aim of this text is to propose a cross-reading of some revolutionary writings by Georg Forster (1754-1794) and Frantz Fanon (1925-1961), emphasising how both contributed to a reflection on the theory and the practice of the Revolution. The affinities of their exilic experiences will be considered, as well as the way in which the concept of revolution they drew on presents important overlaps, namely as regards the understanding of it as an inaugural, necessarily violent moment, as a stage inherent to a process of liberation. This proposed juxtaposition aims at offering a less Eurocentric, more oblique, perspective on revolutionary processes, while also implicitly addressing the challenges of our contemporaneity.