Bittersweet Goodbyes & New Beginnings

Every time we come to write a post here, it’s often high time that we did so, and now is no exception.

We’re starting to look forward towards the future, after a difficult start to the year. 2025 rounded out its last quarter with a number of deaths that hit us and loved ones hard; one such passing was that of Raph – Raphael Oliver Francis Roth Lehmann, if we’re padding out the word count – who took his own life on 21st December.

Members of Anarres attended (both in-person & online) his burial & (packed) funeral in & around Edinburgh on 26th January, and our grief was mixed with a kind of bittersweet wonder at the sheer amount of people that Raph’s life had brought together. We knew him first and foremost as a committed anarchist, socialist, trans-ally, and all-round solid comrade – meeting as we did through Radical Routes (alongside Edinburgers Bruadair and Liverpool-based Persons Unknown, Raph’s Glaswegian co-op Redcurrant joined us in what we thought of as a mini-wave of new upstart co-ops); yet it seems the majority present knew him most as a musician (on clarinet, guitar, piano, or vocals in Edelweiss Pirates, Och Vey, the Stay Gones, Turtle Lamone, and Unbegun), DIY-gig promoter (Walk the Plank Promotions), footie fan (ex-treasurer of Saltire Thistle FC), as well as brother, son, or fiancé.

Hirsute, tall, brimming with ready laughter, he and his compassion, generosity, and energy were seemingly everywhere. Yet his last years of mental illness devoured much of that loud positivity. Surrounded by friends and exploring his Jewish heritage, he seemed to try so hard to hold on, but it wasn’t to be. Raph, you’ll be loved and missed for many a year.

Yet we temper such a weight of loss with cautious hope, too. Our work continues as ever in the Radical Routes network – in publicity, helping co-ordinate the kids’ space, and delivering intro workshops to the new and the curious. We recently sat on a co-ops panel for the students of Shift Bristol‘s permaculture course, and are fast approaching our fourth anniversary house-warming.

And also, the first Eclipse gathering has just finished, too. Eclipse 2029 is a new network looking to bring together anarchists and their projects so that they might strengthen each others’ work, refine each others’ theories, build trust, and generally just kick that brand of petty, sectarian bickering out of real life, and back into Life of Brian. Post-gathering, Eclipse is currently finding its feet and trying to work our what it can and can’t do, through a mesh of working groups and monthly meetings, and will probably manifest in-person once more during the summer. At this stage, some Anarrans feel somewhat emboldened and hopeful. Cautiously hopeful, but still.