Eugène Pottier (1816–1887)

French proletarian revolutionist and poet of the working-class; one of the principal leaders of the Paris Commune; lyricist of the Internationale.

Pottier was born on October 4, 1816, on rue Sainte-Anne, Paris, France into a poor worker’s home. After working as an apprentice, elementary school teacher, shopkeeper and laborer, he had a penchant for poetry. In 1830, when the people of Paris overthrew the rule of the Bourbon Dynasty, Pottier wrote his maiden work Vive la liberté! (Long Live Freedom!). After 1840, he wrote many battle poems reflecting major events in French political life. He participated successively in the February Revolution and the 1848 June Uprising in France. In April 1870, he joined the International Workers’ Association and was elected a member of the Paris Federation. After the establishment of the Paris Commune in 1871, he was elected a member of the Commune, a member of the Executive Committee of the Federation of Artists, and a member of the Committee of Public Services, and ran hither and thither for consolidating the achievements of the Commune. On the second day after the failure of the Commune, Pottier, in a mood of grief and indignation, wrote the lyrics of the Internationale, which later became an inspiration for the proletarians of the world to fight for their emancipation. Subsequently, he was exiled to England and the United States and returned to his motherland in 1880 to join the Socialist Workers’ Party of France. Pottier published many poetry booklets, all of which were lost, only the Revolutionary Songs and the Complete Works of Pottier have been handed down. The first volume of the Revolutionary Songs was published in 1884, and the second volume of the Revolutionary Songs was published in 1887. In November 1887, Pottier died in Paris and was buried in the Père Lachaise Cemetery. When Lenin commemorated the 25th anniversary of his death in January 1913, he wrote a special article entitled Eugène Pottier, in which he spoke highly of Pottier himself and his contribution to the international workers’ movement, praising him as one of the greatest propagandists by song.