Q: “ You threw paving stones at [the cops]?” A: “ Oh yeah. I had no problem doing that. And I threw marbles as well that we stole from stores. And towards the end we even managed to steal tractors from construction sites and we knocked over trees with them .” The mass protests that shook France in May 1968 were exciting, dangerous, creative, and influential, changing European politics to this day. Students demonstrated, workers went on general strike, and factories and universities were occupied. Before it was all over, children, homemakers, and the elderly were swept up in the life-changing events that targeted bureaucratic capitalism and the staid Communist Party. The French state was on the ropes and feared civil war or revolution. Decades later, here are the eye-opening oral testimonies of those young rebels who demanded the impossible. Published on the 50th anniversary of those momentous events, May Made Me presents the legacy of the uprising: how those explosive experiences changed both the individual and history. “These powerful and moving testimonies create an eye-opening account of the inspiring events of May ’68, which are more relevant for today’s activists than ever before.” —Paul Mason, author of Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future “These powerful and moving testimonies create an eye-opening account of the inspiring events of May ’68, which are more relevant for today’s activists than ever before.” —Paul Mason, author of Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future The mass protests that shook France in May 1968 were exciting, dangerous, creative and influential, changing European politics to this day. Students demonstrated, workers went on general strike, factories and universities were occupied. At the height of its fervor, it brought the entire national economy to a halt. The protests reached such a point that political leaders feared civil war or revolution.Fifty years later, here are the eye-opening oral testimonies of those young rebels. By listening to the voices of students and workers, as opposed to that of their leaders, May ?68 appears not just as a mass event, but rather as an event driven by millions of individuals, achieving a mosaic human portrait of France at the time.This book reveals the legacy of the uprising: how those explosive experiences changed both the individual, and history. May Made Me will record these moments before history moves on yet again. Mitchell Abidor is a translator from Brooklyn whose works include A Socialist History of the French Revolution by Jean Jaurès and Anarchists Never Surrender by Victor Serge. Jean-Jacques Lebel Jean-Jacques Lebel was born in 1932 and so was older than the students by some ten years, but he "was never a student—Never went to university." He began his political life "on the left of the left" during the war in Algeria, protesting the war and doing support work for the FLN. But along with politics, Lebel, son of the important gallerist Robert Lebel, "was completely engaged as a so-called experimental artist" I thought art was a good way of expressing the non-belonging to the capitalist system and to try to invent and imagine alternatives not only to the dominant culture, but the dominant way of life.? He organized Happenings throughout Europe, befriended and translated the Beats? So who was it that came up with the list of demands? I did. There?s a video of them being read to the press; was that you? I read them to everybody from the stage. There were thousands of people there by then. What was extraordinary for me was not what we did, because actually it was extremely easy. What was really wonderful … was that people, middle-aged guys with beer bellies, came up crying on stage – we'd opened the stage to everybody – y'know: "I'm from the CGT, I've been in the Communist Party since I'm 18 and I realized it was bullshit and I didn't know what to do, and all of a sudden I realized there is an alternative and you're showing us there is an alternative; here's my party card," and he tore it up. Guys were crying and I realized we were onto something really important, because they were transforming their very lives. People had been railroaded into being slaves, either of the boss in the factory or of the union or of the party, they were always subdued into obeying orders by the bureaucrats or the bosses. And all of a sudden they realized they could be freer if they joined forces with other human beings who wanted the same things. And we saw this in front of our own eyes. And we saw a social movement growing, thanks to this small little thing that we had done. We saw people coming from all walks of life, there was a general strike, and people hitchhiked from Marseilles, from all over France, and even from other countries to say "We're with you." People who were the age of our grandparents. And then we realized we were onto something really fundamental. I saw this happening right before my eyes, and I want to tell you that to