Viva Brighton October 2015 Issue #32

its and bobs
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on the buses
#6 prince kropotkin (No 49)
Prince Kropotkin’s prison break involved a message hidden in a
watch, a delivery of firewood, and various accomplices – one to distract
the soldier at the gate, another to play the violin as a coast-isclear
signal, and others to hire all nearby cabs to stop the getaway
vehicle being pursued. It worked: he outran a bayonet-wielding
sentry, got to the cab, and was taken into hiding.
Kropotkin had shunned his aristocratic military background and,
under a pseudonym, secretly got involved in revolutionary agitation. Caught in 1874, he was held without
trial for two years, until his escape. He snuck out of Russia and spent the next four decades in exile, mostly
in the UK.
In Britain, he worked as a science journalist, writing about anarchism and society on the side. His best
known book, Mutual Aid, blended the two, using examples from human and animal societies to argue that
co-operation was a better survival strategy than competition.
A mild-mannered anarchist, Kropotkin ‘became a fashionable figure in London, lauded by the late-Victorian
artistic and intellectual avant garde,’ in the Guardian’s words.
He moved to Kemptown around 1911, for health reasons. Jerome K Jerome wrote in his memoirs: ‘Prince
Kropotkin himself was a kindly, dapper little gentleman of aristocratic appearance, but his compatriots,
who came to visit him, there was no mistaking. The sight of them, as they passed by, struck terror to the
stoutest hearts of Kemp Town.’
After the February Revolution, Kropotkin left Brighton for Russia, where he died in 1921.
Illustration by Joda, jonydaga.weebly.com
spread the word
This month’s picture was sent in by readers
Gill and Howard Cox, who took our
July issue with them over the Pond in the
summer. Normally contributors show off
the mag’s front cover, but this time Gill
and Howard’s daughters Georgie and
Emily have opened it out so cover artist
Naomi Sloman’s picture of Yosemite
Park is revealed; and they are standing in
front of the same mountains as Naomi
has illustrated (if you use a bit of imagination,
at least). Keep them coming!
hello@vivamagazines.com
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