Death
After his flight, support for him dwindled, and the Boulangists were defeated in the general elections of July 1889 (after the government forbade Boulanger from running). Boulanger himself went to live in Jersey before returning to the Ixelles Cemetery in Brussels in September 1891 to commit suicide by a bullet to the head on the grave of his mistress, Madame de Bonnemains (née Marguerite Crouzet) who had died in his arms the preceding July. He was interred in the same grave.
Several incidents followed Boulanger's death, including an armed attack carried out by a boulangiste against the Republican politician Jules Ferry, in December of the same year. Although largely discredited, the trend started by Boulanger was still visible inside the far right (the anti-Dreyfusards) during France's next major scandal, the Dreyfus Affair. Israeli historian Zeev Sternhell cites boulangisme as a major influence on Fascism, alongside Anarcho-syndicalism and the Cercle Proudhon.
Read more about this topic: Georges Ernest Boulanger
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“Death is too much for men to bear, whereas women, who are practiced in bearing the deaths of men before their own and who are also practiced in bearing life, take death almost in stride. They go to meet death—that is, they attempt suicide—twice as often as men, though men are more “successful” because they use surer weapons, like guns.”
—Roger Rosenblatt (b. 1940)
“As death, when we come to consider it closely, is the true goal of our existence, I have formed during the last few years such close relations with this best and truest friend of mankind, that his image is not only no longer terrifying to me, but is indeed very soothing and consoling! And I thank my God for graciously granting me the opportunity ... of learning that death is the key which unlocks the door to our true happiness.”
—Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791)
“Men are fools that wish to die!
Is ‘t not fine to dance and sing
When the bells of death do ring?”
—Unknown. Hey Nonny No! (L. 2–4)