Rosa Luxembourg: the life and death of a revolutionary

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:44

Probably, many have heard or read that in 2009 a special flower was bred in Europe - the rose "Princess of Luxembourg". This event was timed to coincide with the 18th anniversary of Alexandra, the royal person of the Grand Duchy. But today we are not talking about him. People of the older generation remember that at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century there was such a German revolutionary and quite an influential person who played an important role in the formation of the communist movement in Europe. Her name was consonant with the name of a beautiful flower - Rosa Luxembourg. The years of this woman's life were entirely devoted to the struggle for the rights and freedoms of ordinary people. It is about her that will be discussed in this article.

Jewish family

Rose (real name Rosalia) was born on March 5, 1871 in the town of Zamosc of the Kingdom of Poland, on the outskirts of the then Russian Empire. She was the fifth child in the family of a timber merchant of Jewish origin, Eliash Luxembourg. The girl was a diligent student and brilliantly graduated from one of the Warsaw gymnasiums.

This friendly Jewish family was very fond ofchildren, and even more so the younger Rosochka, who was disabled (dislocation of the hip joint). Until the age of 10, an irreversible and extremely painful process took place in her body, sometimes bedridden for several months. When she matured, the disease receded, but the lameness remained. In order to hide this defect at least a little, she wore special shoes. The girl, of course, was very worried about lameness, so it is no wonder that on this basis she could develop a number of complexes.

The start of the journey

It must be said that Rosa Luxembourg, whose biography, as you know, was mainly associated with revolutionary activities, began to show interest in politics very early, while still studying. After graduating from high school, her parents tried her best to dissuade her from such a rather dangerous hobby and even hired the best music teacher for her. They still hoped that the talented girl would seriously take up art and forget about politics, but Rosa had already embarked on a revolutionary path, where she expected to realize all her ambitious plans. Among her new friends, she was on an equal footing, since none of them paid the slightest attention to her physical defect.

At the end of the 1880s. most of the illegal revolutionary groups began to overcome the differences of opinion that were associated with the choice of path. By the way, even then it was clear that terror does not justify itself, and only fanatics support it. The bulk of young people leaned towards legal methods of struggle.

RoseLuxembourg came to the revolutionary circle at a time when the anti-terrorist conflict between its members was growing, and sided with those who were categorically against the killings and advocated propaganda and agitation activities. But the terrorists continued to commit their illegal actions, which put their own dissident party members into the hands of the police.

It was precisely because of this that at the age of 18, Rosa was forced to hide from persecution by the authorities for her participation in the underground organization Proletariat. She had to emigrate to Switzerland, where she continued her education at the University of Zurich. There, the girl studied law, philosophy and political economy.

First love

The years spent in quiet Switzerland, Rosa Luxembourg (see photo in the review) recalled as the happiest in her life. Here she felt calm and confident. In Zurich, the girl met a certain Leo Jogiches, who she immediately liked very much. The young man also showed interest in Rosa, but he did not take any decisive action - their relationship was reduced only to talking about politics and visiting libraries together. Therefore, the girl had to take the initiative herself and declare her love to him.

It is worth noting that before that Leo was a convinced bachelor, and he gave up only after the fiery confession of Rosa. She was a very energetic person, but gradually the indefatigable activity of the girl began to irritate the man, given that the activities of Jogiches himselfwas difficult. Therefore, naturally, frequent conflicts began to occur among lovers. Finally, Rosa Luxembourg brilliantly defended her dissertation at the University of Zurich on the pace of Poland's industrial development. It was this event that became the climax of their quarrels.

The girl was very proud of her success, as her work was highly appreciated by well-known professors, and her articles were published in reputable socialist publications. Thus, all of Europe recognized her name. But Leo himself was not enthusiastic about Rosa's achievements, knowing full well that he had fallen under the influence of an extremely strong woman, and this state of affairs did not suit him at all.

First Conclusion

Soon Rosa Luxemburg, at the invitation of the German Socialist Party, agrees to participate in local elections as an agitator. The woman was engaged in propaganda in the regions of Upper Silesia, where many Poles lived. In this way, she was able to win the confidence of the German socialists very quickly. In this environment, revolutionary Clara Zetkin becomes her best friend. She introduces Luxembourg to her son, as well as to the famous theorist Karl Kautsky. In addition, here in Germany, in 1901, Rosa will meet with Vladimir Lenin.

After the beginning of the revolutionary events in Russia in 1905, she comes to Warsaw and actively participates in the protest actions of Polish workers. After some time, the tsarist secret police manage to catch and put her in prison. Luxembourg spent several months there, under the threat of hard labor or even execution. Howeverthanks to the efforts of her German friends, she was released from prison in 1907, after which she left for Germany forever.

Private life

In order to move to the country for permanent residence, Rosa needed to obtain German citizenship. The fastest way to do this was to conclude a fictitious marriage with a citizen of this state. Luxembourg's formal husband was Gustav Lübeck. In the same year, the woman began a long-term romance with the son of her friend Clara Zetkin, Konstantin. This fact is evidenced by about 600 letters that have survived to this day.

Konstantin admired the fiery speeches of his mistress, so she literally became his mentors in the study of Marxism. The couple broke up five years later. Since that time, Rosa Luxembourg has not had any more love affairs. She was not very interested in children, since she never stopped organizing the revolutionary movement, and, frankly, she had no time for them.

Activities during World War I

On the eve of the war, in 1913, for a speech delivered against the rapidly growing militarism in Germany, Luxembourg was arrested for a period of one year. After leaving prison, she did not stop her anti-war agitation. On August 1, 1914, when the Kaiser of Germany declared war on the Russian Empire, the faction of socialists, which was part of the then German parliament, voted in favor of taking war loans. Luxembourg was just beside herself with such shortsightednessher colleagues and, together with her new like-minded people, immediately created the political magazine Internationale. No sooner had Rosa written her first article for this publication than she was again arrested and put in a Berlin prison.

In February 1915, she was imprisoned once again for speaking at a rally in Frankfurt am Main. A year later, she was released, but three months later she was arrested again. This time she was given a longer term - two and a half years. At that time, she was no longer young, and besides, she was sick and lonely, but, considering that the best doctor was work, Rosa wrote a lot while in prison.

Establishment of the German Communist Party

When the fighting was going on, she finds herself the same ardent like-minded person as herself, in the person of the revolutionary Karl Liebknecht. Together they create a new organization - the Spartak Union. In December 1918, they again became the founders of the German Communist Party together.

At the first congress of the new organization, Rosa Luxembourg delivered a report in which she rather harshly criticized the Russian Bolsheviks for establishing a one-party dictatorship in the country, which, in her opinion, severely violated democratic freedoms, and also contributed to the suppression of all opposition parties.

Ruthless Roller of Revolution

When a woman was released from prison again in 1918, the November Revolution was already in full swing in Germany. Complete control over the social situationlost, and the bloody terror literally spilled onto the streets, bringing with it all the anger that had accumulated over the years of the First World War.

As you know, any revolution is terrible because it does not divide people into right and wrong, but crushes everyone who falls under its bloody roller. And the story of Rosa Luxembourg is proof of that. She became one of the victims of her own former party comrades, who were in a hurry to quickly, so to speak, on the sly, get rid of a restless and objectionable colleague.

Death of a revolutionary

On January 15, 1919, Luxembourg, along with her colleague Karl Liebknecht, was arrested and taken to the Eden Hotel. At the entrance to the building, she was met by a crowd, consisting entirely of soldiers and officers, who began to shower the woman with swear words. She was then subjected to a very humiliating interrogation, after which she was led out of the hotel on the pretext of being placed in the Moabit prison.

When the woman was being led down the corridor, one of the soldiers attacked her and hit her twice on the head. When she fell, the guards picked her up and carried her into the car, where the beating continued. The murder of Rosa Luxembourg took place in this car, on the way to the prison, when, finally tired of mocking the woman, the tormentors shot her, and threw the corpse into the waters of the Landwehr Canal. Only a few months later, namely on June 1, her remains were discovered and fished out of the water. The revolutionary was buried 13 days later at the Friedrichsfelde cemetery in Berlin.