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Good Book on The French Revolution and one on Robspierre

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  • 20-08-2014 1:21am
    #1
    Shoelaces
    Registered Users Posts: 313 ✭✭


    Any suggestions?


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    #2
    Reekwind
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,126 ✭✭✭Reekwind


    I can't recommend a good introductory work to the entire period but on Ruth Scurr's 'Fatal Purity' is an excellent biography of Robespierre. You might also want to check out David Andress' 'The Terror', which does an excellent job of putting the Revolution into the context of the social civil war that engulfed France in those years.


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    #3
    Manach
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 9,664 Mod ✭✭✭✭Manach


    Ruth Scurr's 'Fatal Purity' ++.
    Also Belloc's French Revolution. A tad dated but very well written.
    I've not read his writing on the Revolution, but Alistair Horne is generally well regarded on French History.


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    #4
    Shoelaces
    Registered Users Posts: 313 ✭✭Shoelaces


    Great stuff, thanks for the help!


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    #5
    ChicagoJoe
    Registered Users Posts: 372 ✭✭ChicagoJoe


    Interesting character Robspierre. I'm sure the guys who have read up on him know a lot more than me but I believe he may have had a nervous break down due to the pressure of the revolution and hence that may explain some of his bloodier directives.


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    #6
    patsman07
    Registered Users Posts: 282 ✭✭patsman07


    Mark Steel wrote a great book on the French Revolution. Think it was called 'Vive La Revolution.' From what I can remember it was quite funny as well as being a great history book. All from an author that is primarily a comedian!


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    #7
    ParsleyQueen
    Registered Users Posts: 31 ✭ParsleyQueen


    These books are fairly ancient, but great fun to read--Claude Manceron's "Twilight of the Old Order" and "Wind from America". The writing is snarky and entertaining, but they're also good history.


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    #8
    DarkyHughes
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,393 ✭✭✭DarkyHughes


    |Didn't Robspierre eventually go insane & think he was a God?


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    #9
    ParsleyQueen
    Registered Users Posts: 31 ✭ParsleyQueen


    DarkyHughes wrote: »
    |Didn't Robspierre eventually go insane & think he was a God?

    From what I can remember of my history, he was pretty high on power. I don't know if he went clinically insane, but he certainly acquired a taste for blood like wayward revolutionaries sometimes do. He got his just desserts in the end.


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    #10
    Reekwind
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,126 ✭✭✭Reekwind


    DarkyHughes wrote: »
    |Didn't Robspierre eventually go insane & think he was a God?
    No. Robespierre, like many successful revolutionaries, was part of a ruling coalition that was largely unscrupulous in its means, while holding to fairly idealistic aims. Like many successful revolutionaries, this contradiction (which falls outside the white/black hat dichotomy) is too nuanced for pop history, which invariably portrays such people as power-mad megalomaniacs.

    (With regards God, you may be thinking of his pet project, the Cult of the Supreme Being)


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