The Revolutionary Temper
Paris, 1748-1789
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- $30.99
Publisher Description
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
“This captivating history of the decades leading up to the French Revolution…immerse[s] readers in what agitated Parisians read, wore, ate and sang on the way to toppling the monarchy of Louis XVI.” —New York Times Book Review
A groundbreaking account of the coming of the French Revolution from a historian of worldwide acclaim.
When a Parisian crowd stormed the Bastille in July 1789, it triggered an event of global consequence: the overthrow of the monarchy and the birth of a new society. Most historians account for the French Revolution by viewing it in retrospect as the outcome of underlying conditions such as a faltering economy, social tensions, or the influence of Enlightenment thought. But what did Parisians themselves think they were doing—how did they understand their world? What were the motivations and aspirations that guided their actions? In this dazzling history, Robert Darnton addresses these questions by drawing on decades of close study to conjure a past as vivid as today’s news. He explores eighteenth-century Paris as an information society much like our own, its news circuits centered in cafés, on park benches, and under the Palais-Royal’s Tree of Cracow. Through pamphlets, gossip, underground newsletters, and public performances, the events of some forty years—from disastrous treaties, official corruption, and royal debauchery to thrilling hot-air balloon ascents and new understandings of the nation—all entered the churning collective consciousness of ordinary Parisians. As public trust in royal authority eroded and new horizons opened for them, Parisians prepared themselves for revolution.
Darnton’s authority and sure judgment enable readers to confidently navigate the passions and complexities of controversies over court politics, Church doctrine, and the economy. And his compact, luminous prose creates an immersive reading experience. Here is a riveting narrative that succeeds in making the past a living presence.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Historian Darnton (Pirating and Publishing) offers a sweeping account of "how Parisians experienced" the decades leading up to the French Revolution. Following the shifting textures of public opinion through "conversations in cafes... underground gazettes... street songs... and processions and festivals," Darnton tracks the emergence of what he calls a "revolutionary temper" in the lived experience of 18th-century Parisians. He highlights the power of satirical street songs, which escaped censorship and served as "sung newspapers" for city dwellers (one particularly bawdy tune sparked a chain of events that led to the arrest of the philosopher Denis Diderot, who had to be bailed out by his publishers); the "craze for science," which manifested in the "frenzy for air balloons" and public fascination with Franz Anton Mesmer's "animal magnetism" (such fads reinforced a growing sense that "just as man had conquered the air, he was gaining mastery over disease and soon would control all of nature there were no limits to the power of his reason"); and the "climate of public opinion" formed by printed pamphlets, which were being produced so rapidly and at such volume that they were "like smoke from thousands of chimneys gathering over the city." Darnton's panoramic vision is rendered in lucid and vigorous prose, with a consistent focus on the day-to-day communications and emotions of regular people. It's an enthralling exploration of the psychology of political change.
