Science!
The word revolutionist attached with an obviously Russian name leads immediately to thoughts of politics. As the text unfolds, however, it becomes clear that Kropotkin fulfills the job of revolutionary in many aspects of its meaning. Such as his revolutionary approach to the study and analysis of geologic time:
“Life dwindled in that part of the northern hemisphere, and, wretchedly poor, uncertain, it fled further and further south before the icy breath which came from that immense frozen mass.”
Support for the Polish Insurrection
The author wraps his revolutionary support for the Polish uprising against Russian authority by placing into stark metaphorical terms the conditions by which no country shall ever successful oppress the nation:
“Poland will never lose her national character, it is too strongly developed; she has, and will have, her own literature, her own art and industry.”
Winter is Ending
Russia is infamous for its long, tough winters that are the ultimate test of endurance. As such, when the seasons turn, it has inspired more than a few writers to lofty descriptive prose. Kropotkin can be placed among them:
“The immense heaps of snow which have been lying during the winter along the streets rapidly thaw, and roaring streams run down the streets; not like a thief who creeps in by insensible degrees, but frankly and openly spring comes”
Eureka!
With a tremendous felicity of literary conveyance, Kropotkin describes the exact moment when a long-pursued theory seems to be scientifically confirmed. It is a description of sublime beauty successful imparting what is likely an almost indescribable feeling:
“Out of a wild confusion of facts and from behind the fog of guesses,—contradicted almost as soon as they are born,—a stately picture makes its appearance, like an Alpine chain suddenly emerging in all its grandeur from the mists which concealed it the moment before, glittering under the rays of the sun in all its simplicity and variety, in all its mightiness and beauty.”
What was Kropotkin?
Kropotkin is famous as a writer. He was a revolutionary. A scientist. An anarchist. An activist. He was far too many things to earn him a label as any particular one of them. He even invented a label for himself that covers pretty well everything he ever did with his life and even goes so far as to pinpoint the moment when he chose to pursue this life:
“That same year I made my start as an investigator of popular life.”
