may 1968, n.Definitions

May 1968 (n.) was ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠as ambiguous as it was exciting — ambiguous because exciting.

May 1968 (n.) was ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠molecular — which is why the parties kept saying 'conditions were not ripe,' and why de Gaulle understood more than the leftists.

May 1968 (n.) refused ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠a humanity defined by self-satisfaction and acquisitions: behind the capital of having, it contested a capital of being — the person as an ontological tumefaction crushing others.

May 1968 (n.) was ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠the expressivist dream rekindled: a society without partitions, where the last barrier to fall is the one between art and life.

May 1968 (n.) showed ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠rebels no different from the calloused commissars they despised: both faced the emptiness of absolute freedom; the commissars at least had a programme of building socialism's conditions.

May 1968 (n.) freed ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠the act of questioning: it put to politics questions about women, sex, medicine, madness and the environment that Marxism proved powerless to answer.

May 1968 (n.) was ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠read as Marx and Freud lit by one fire — the old dream of Reich and the Surrealists come back to set reality ablaze; perhaps the fight had actually moved somewhere new.