Almanac of Story Tellers: Flora Tristan

     Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of April 7th

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    It is the 97th day of the year, leaving 268 days remaining in 2022.

    On this date in 1803, the writer, socialist, and feminist Flora Tristan was born in Bordeaux, France. 

    She wrote and told stories comparing the rights of women with the rights of the working class, saying both had to march in lockstep in order to progress. In her classic work, The Workers' Union, she equated each with a form of slavery.

    She urged workers to form a single union, without references to a particular trade or skill, She said unskilled workers and women must be included, because the subjugation of women was tied to the exploitation of workers.

I call for woman's rights because I am convinced that all the misfortunes in the world come from this neglect and scorn shown until now for the natural and inalienable rights of woman.

    Despite her father being a member of the wealthy Peruvian aristocracy, Tristan felt the effects of a working woman's life. Her father, Mariano Eusebio Antonio Tristán y Moscoso, died when she was young, and she was denied her rightful heritage. She and her mother, Anne-Pierre Laisnay, returned to Paris, where they lived in the slums by the Latin Quarter. 

    During her life, she suffered briefly through a violent marriage, and gave birth to three children. She worked in an engraving shop and as a lady's maid. The latter gave her the oppurtunity to travel through Europe with her employers, and she wrote of her travels.  

    She returned to Peru to, again unsuccessful, claim her heritage. Afterward, she wrote about her experiences in her first book, Peregrinations of a Pariah.

     She became a social activist, singing petitions for the right of people to divorce and against capital punishment. She wrote about the plight of single women, and in favor of socialism. Publishers did not find The Workers' Union to their liking, so she raised funds to have it published. It was wildly successful.

    Tristan, who lived most of her life in France, died in 1844 in Bordeaux. A monument to her, funded by French workers, was erected in 1848, and sits in the Chartreuse Cemetery. One of the city's libraries is named after her.