The French Revolution brought momentous political, social, and cultural change. Life in Revolutionary France asks how these changes affected everyday lives, in urban and rural areas, and on an international scale.
An international cast of distinguished academics and emerging scholars present new research on how people experienced and survived the revolutionary decade, with a particular focus on individual and collective agency as discovered through the archival record, material culture, and the history of emotions. It combines innovative work with student-friendly essays to offer fresh perspectives on topics such as:
* Political identities and activism
* Gender, race, and sexuality
* Transatlantic responses to war and revolution
* Local and workplace surveillance and transparency
* Prison communities and culture
* Food, health, and radical medicine
* Revolutionary childhoods
With an easy-to-navigate, three-part structure, illustrations and primary source excerpts, Life in Revolutionary France is the essential text for approaching the experiences of those who lived through one of the most turbulent times in world history.
List of Figures List of Maps List of Contributors Acknowledgements Introduction: Rethinking the Revolutionary Everyday, Mette Harder and Jennifer Ngaire Heuer Part I. Revolutionary Identities and Spaces 1. Republicans and Royalists: Seeking Authentic Rural Voices in the Sources of the French Revolution, Jill Maciak Walshaw Source: Trial of Thomas Bordas, a weaver from Segonzac, department of the Dordogne, accused of having publicly stated that he wanted to be governed by a king. 28 pluviôse–12 prairial year IV (February 17, 1796–May 31, 1796) 2. Mapping Women’s Everyday Lives in Revolutionary Marseille, Laura Talamante Source: Deliberation of the Dames Citoyennes from the Saint-Martin District, no. 7, 7 July 1790 3. Emigration, Landlords, and Tenants in Revolutionary Paris, Hannah Callaway Source: Overview of Rentals in the Boulainvilliers Market on 24 Fructidor VI (September 10, 1798) 4. Home Fronts and Battlefields: The Army, Warfare, and the Revolutionary Experience, Christopher Tozzi Source (a): “It should come as no surprise if I want to make a Jew into a soldier.” Speech by the Abbé Henri Grégoire at the National Assembly, 23 December 1789 Source (b): From the Petition of the Jews Established in France addressed to the National Assembly, 28 January 1790 5. Race, Freedom, and Everyday Life: French Caribbean Prisoners of War in Britain, Abigail Coppins and Jennifer Ngaire Heuer Source: Undated Report on the State of the Prisons and Hospitals of Portchester and Forton (likely from the end of 1796), TNA (The National Archives) ADM 105/44 Part II. The Right To? – Revolutionary Justice at Work 6. Crime, Law, and Justice, Claire Cage Source: Penal Code of 25 September 1791 7. Surveillance at Work: A Theft on the Rue du Bac, Ralph Kingston Source: Defense Statement by Citizen Bonnet, former employee of the [French Ministry of] External Relations. Written after his termination for theft on 7 Fructidor VIII (August 25, 1800) 8. Sex as Work: Public Women in Revolutionary Paris, Clyde Plumauzille Source: Letters by a Woman arrested for Prostitution under the “Terror” 9. Doctors, Radicalism, and the Right to Health: Three Visions from the French Revolution, Sean M. Quinlan Source: The French Doctor and Legislator François Lanthenas on Freedom, Health and Hygiene: De l’influence de la liberté sur la santé (1792) Part III. Revolutionary Experience, Practices, Sensations 10. Tasting Liberty: Food and Revolution, E. C. Spary Source: Anon., “L’Hydre aristocratique,” Paris, 1789 11. Spectacles of French Revolutionary Violence in the Atlantic World, Ashli White Source: Massachusetts Mercury (Boston), December 25, 1795, page 3: This Evening – Advert for Bowen’s Museum 12. Practice and Belief: Religion in the Revolution, Jonathan Smyth Source: Extract from Robespierre’s Speech on Freedom of Worship, made at the Jacobin Club, Paris on November 21, 1793 (1 Frimaire Year 2 of the Revolution) 13. Facing the Unknown: The Private Lives of Miniatures in the French Revolutionary Prison, Sophie Matthiesson Source: Hubert Robert (1733–1808), Jean-Antoine Roucher (1745–1794) as he prepares to be transferred from Sainte-Pélagie to Saint-Lazare, 1794 14. Revolutionary Parents and Children: Everyday Lives in Times of Stress, Siân Reynolds Source: The Families of Revolutionaries Recommended Readings Index
Mette Harder is Associate Professor of History at SUNY Oneonta, USA. Jennifer Ngaire Heuer is Associate Professor of History at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA. She is the author of The Family and The Nation: Gender and Citizenship in Revolutionary France, 1789-1830 (2005).
Reviews for Life in Revolutionary France
[A]n outstanding, often brilliant, collection which deserves recognition and frequent consultation for its refreshing insights into the myriad worlds of revolutionary experience. * French Studies * I have never seen such an edited volume before. Every chapter offers original scholarship and new methodological approaches, which could help any student of history read their sources with fresh eyes. This book not only teaches social and cultural history but also instructs students how to become better historians. I can offer no greater praise than the fact that I am excited to use this book in my French Revolution classes, and it also helped me to reframe my own research projects. * H-France Review * With this engaging collection, Mette Harder and Jennifer Ngaire Heuer take distance from notions of the French Revolution as an engine of abstract change to explore how that event shaped individual lives and to examine how seemingly private choices intersected with broad social, political, and cultural movements. * Canadian Journal of History * Life in Revolutionary France revivifies the social history of the French revolution. Mette Harder and Jennifer Ngaire Heuer’s fine team of experienced and emergent scholars offer bright, insightful coverage of topics that range from religion to revolutionary justice, from prisons to prostitution, from émigrés to Caribbean slaves, from armies to waxworks, from crime to diet - and much besides. * Colin Jones, Professor of History, Queen Mary University of London, UK * Ranging from peasant resisters and Caribbean prisoners of war to prostitutes and the orphaned children of executed revolutionary leaders, this remarkably original collection opens dramatic new perspectives on the French Revolution. The ordinary is shown to be extraordinarily fascinating when lives are transformed by dramatic events. Anyone interested in the meaning of revolution will want to read these essays. * Lynn Hunt, Distinguished Research Professor of History, UCLA, USA * The anthology is therefore an overall highly readable, inspiring and important contribution to the research debate. * Zeitschrift fur Historische Forschung (Bloomsbury Translation) *
