Perpignan Writings

Abstract

Georges Sorel was born in Cherbourg in 1847; not until 1886 did he publish his first article. Of his early years we know relatively little; partly because Sorel never referred to them in his writings. He was brought up in a bourgeois family; his father experienced financial problems; his mother was a pious Catholic and, apparently, had a dominant influence over her young son. Educated initially in Cherbourg, Sorel completed his education in Paris: first at the Collège Rollin and then at the Ecole Polytechnique, France’s premier technical institution. From 1870 to 1892 he was an engineer in the Ministère des Ponts et des Chaussées. These years were spent travelling through France, Corsica, and Algeria as a loyal servant of the Republic. His final years of public service from 1879 onwards were spent in the southern town of Perpignan, a situation in which Sorel, a respected and respectful member of a government ministry, was clearly happy. In 1891 he was awarded the Légion d’Honneur.¹