ABSTRACT
G reat events leave a wake o f m em ory, legend an d controversy. T he C om m une is an acute case because it im m ediately provoked durably im p o rtan t ideological in terp re ta tions while also genera ting deep em otions, so m uch so th a t it has often b een suggested th a t the C om m une’s ‘m yth’ is m ore im p o rtan t th an its reality. Artistic, ideological an d historical rep resen ta tions overlapped. Relatively dispassionate investigation was therefo re difficult, an d alm ost sacri legious. As late as the 1960s an d ’70s, p ioneers o f archival research such as Jacques R ougerie were vehem ently attacked for bring ing inapp ro p ria te ‘objectivity’ to the subject. Even recen t works on the C om m une are - presum ably unknow n to th e ir au thors - hybrids of fiction, polem ic an d history. Eugene Schulkind n o ted two decades ago th a t a lthough the C om m une is ‘one o f the m ost vigorously debated n in e teen th -cen tu ry subjects . . . it is also one whose docu m en ta tion has still to be stud ied thorough ly ’.1 This is still largely, if decreasingly, true.
