Welcome to 1789

Hi all,

I'm trying to find non-fiction reading on the French Guard that is written (or has been translated into) English. A lot of the seemingly helpful material I'm finding is in French which, sadly, I don't speak. I'm especially interested in their involvement during the storming of the Bastille. Books, articles, websites, etc... Anything would be helpful. My limited knowledge only comes from a few minutes in class and fiction. :)

(So far I have had two works by Alan Forrest recommended to me -- The Soldiers of the French Revolution and Conscripts and Deserters)

Harvard has just published a book called The Classical Tradition which includes a chapter by M.Sellers called "Classical Influences on the Law and Politics of the French Revolution". Masochists may download in from the SSRN. I will just add that, in my opinion, the abstract is a bunch of all sins a historian or anyone approaching history may commit. Moreover, these "sins" have very strong ideological implications. And I cannot but laugh at "transatlantic successes", I mean, Soviet propaganda wouldn't express it better XD 


The abstract provided by the author is extremely eloquent:
Abstract:     
The French Revolution was the last great political event to take its inspiration, iconography and institutions primarily from classical antiquity. French revolutionaries depended heavily on Roman and Greek history for ideas, and for the courage to apply them. But even if their understanding of history had been accurate (it seldom was) French politicians could never settle which ancient model to follow. Classical antiquity provides innumerable conflicting moral and political examples and the French came close to having tried them all, running through the whole of Roman history in fifteen years. Eighteenth-century Frenchmen postured as Romans, Athenians and Spartans, without ever achieving liberty against arbitrary power, or any consistent rule of law. The French Revolution’s ostentatious classicism, comprehensive experimentation, and obvious failure, discredited Roman and Greek antiquity as practical models for political reform. Future revolutions would need new models, including the experience of France itself, and the transatlantic successes of the United States of America. The French Revolution discredited classical antiquity, by following it too capriciously, too blindly and to the bitter end.

 Keywords: classical tradition, French Revolution, French republic, Roman republic, Sparta, Athens, neo-classicism, constitutionalism, liberty, rule of law, separation of powers, Rousseau, Constant, Robespierre
(see: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1437165)

(A letter to half-sister Iwi Bennet, sent from Gdańsk, dated June 23rd-24th [19]28; translation to English, with shortenings marked, based on German to Polish translation provided by Antoni Weiland in third volume of Przybyszewska's letters, edited in Gdańsk in 1985)

I find this passage interesting and slightly relevant to my last entry, as well as Andrzej Wajda's idea of Robespierre and Saint-Just being, ehm, involved...

"Nowadays, when Freud's awful discovery serves as a toy for all kinds of idiots, it has become fashionable to explain everything that is not average as a sexual deviation (...) Revolutionaries are a true Klondike for those prying sexuologists making psychoanalysis a journalistic sensation, never having the slightest idea neither about revolution, nor about sociology. I had to read three treatises where these mediocrities were "psychoanalyzing" Robespierre. These bastards find it ambiguous when a man living only for one unearthly great ideal is forced to work 24 hours a day, coming home exhausted to the point of mental stupor - if such a man, having a strong conviction that he'll not live past the age of 35 years - does not set up home and does not have a cosy family life. Robespierre did what others in his situation used to: he resigned from all human and private relations, satisfying himself, when needed, with street girls. Not everyone has time, will and money for Casanova-like intrigues. And yes, this abstinence is the key to his life wnd work. Some people, who have read something from Michelet or Auluard, and only the passages mentioning his name - explain everything about Robespierre with his impotence (which is just a proof of their ignorance about the memoires of the period). Others, trying to be more noble and insightful - with homosexuality. They don't have to trouble themselves a lot here, with Robespierre's delicacy and elegance, his contralto voice, his almost tragic attachment to a likable blockhead Desmoulins and - basic thing - his attitude towards this wonderful man, St.-Just.
Yes, as you know, I do have a certain faible for homosexuals, if they are masculine and not feminine (I call this pure form of male homosexuality - a Platonic love, to rehabilitate this term). But I am sure - only pretenses here - that there were nothing of sexual kind between R[obespierre] and St.-Just. Yes, with Desmoulins - perhaps, especially from Desmoulins' side - he was a creature after Wilde's fashion - his attachment to a stronger friend from school, political leader later and opponent at the end - shows all signs of passion. But Saint-Just -?
An inconceivable relationship,inconceivable people."

I know that the festival of the supreme being hastened Maxime's fall but certaintly he must of known this, right? Why didn't anyone stop him? I mean why did the CPS and convention or any of his allies ever stopped him? And how in the hell, did they let him stage IT?!! Did they not have any sense either? I'm seriously wondering that xD I mean..that's bugged me when i read all sorts of things on it but they never explained why. Unless..everyone was on crack..then i can totally understand.


>.> and expect some fanart from me in a few days time. Hahah, i have some other twisting ideas that should be fun to draw xD *cracks up*

and on a total unrelated note: The CPS's table. Their table. I swear to the supreme being that i keep thinking it's circle or oval rather than a rectangle or SQUARE; =/ (which still pisses me off that we were lied that a square and rectangle were DIFFERENT shapes, not a special type of rectangle or special type of square. whatever =/ IGNORE ME xD Ranting a lot xD)

For the first ten minutes of LTELV: Danton
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSdcIm1HSx0&feature=related
 

For the whole LTELV: Robespierre
 http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rrk5_la-revolution-francaise-ep1-part-15_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rrtg_la-revolution-francaise-ep1-part-25_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rs5f_la-revolution-francaise-ep1-part-35_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rse8_la-revolution-francaise-ep1-part-45_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rsk8_la-revolution-francaise-ep1-part-55_news
 

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rsra_la-revolution-francaise-ep2-part-14_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rsx0_la-revolution-francaise-ep2-part-24_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rt4o_la-revolution-francaise-ep2-part-34_news
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rt6b_la-revolution-francaise-ep2-part-44_news
 

"Actually, they were almost the same age, with a difference of two years only, but never really realizing this fact. They both accepted Maxime as the older one with no doubt. Their mutual feelings were much stronger than normal friendship; it was simply love from both sides, in Camille's case with a huge amount of adoration. The condition for his own happiness was Maxime being close to him; an adult child tended to live in a constant exhausting rebelion against his own slave's dependence. Yet the feelings of the older one were probably even stronger, though they did not restrain his being. Maxime's love was 'at least strange', entirely protective, much more passionate than fraternal attachment, not even paternal, but typically maternal. A kind of love hard to bear, painful, monstrously deep, mindless to the point of absurd, full of nervous fear and insatiable tenderness - in the case of a man, of course, hidden extremly well. During the last months, he didn't have time - nor right - to ponder Camille, aching in his all body with a dumb pain he refused to even think about; for half a year Camille had been giving him one stroke after another, deliberately and knowingly hitting the weakest point each time. An incredibly strong attack of malaria, from which Maxime was pulling through with such a toil, was probably the result of this game. A love of this kind is ripped of any dignity so far that the more your darling one harasses you, the more loved he is."

Not mine, though I wouldn't mind it to be. This piece of fanfiction is almost a hundred years old, being a part of a novel by Stanisława Przybyszewska, Ostatnie noce ventôse'a / The Last Nights of Ventôse. Posted in this community because it's one of a very few places where the author's name is recognized, and I think she is worth it.

Translation by me.

Okay i have to ask..because i don't think anyone has..

*look around the corners suspiciously*

Since i've been recently for the whole weekend, nursing a bad infection thus staying in bed like Maxime xD I thought..

why not?

anyhow, from any french revolutionary film, what is your favorite portrayal of Maxime or Saint-Just or Camille?

I have to think upon t his..>.>no i know it! I like Andrzej Seweryn as Maxime in La révolution française =0

Hi people,

(I think this is all right under the advertising rules - if not, I will totally understand if the Mods want to delete it.)

Anyway! I'm here to mention that I have nominated Dantons Tod and The Danton Case for yuletide - A Place of Greater Safety had already been nominated, which is great because it's my all-time favourite.

So, lots and lots of potential for revolutionary goodness (or, indeed, badness...) at Christmas, and I thought I'd post about it here in case anyone else fancied signing up for yuletide and requesting/offering these fandoms. Or indeed other revolution-focused books or films: the film Danton; City of Darkness, City of Light - there are lots of other things that could be nominated. I chose my nominations based on level of slashiness between Camille and Danton, I must admit...

I'm definitely planning to request, and probably offer revolution!fic - last year I was given a wonderful Camille/Danton story, which was a pretty amazing thing to wake up to on Christmas day. :)

Bonsoir citoyens--

I apologize for my lack of posts over the last few months. I have recently begun graduate school, which has sapped my energy almost completely (but it is great, I love it). I have been, however, checking this site periodically, and I have enjoyed reading the discussions although not having participated in them.

If you all remember, my revolutionary drug of choice is dear, dear Camille. This past summer, I was seriously dedicated to a certain project--of writing a novel about his life--which I started on, deeply in earnest. I completed a few chapters. Productivity has since tapered off, and, in conjunction with a sad realization that this project will never reach fruition (at least in the form of a straightforward Life of Camille), I have given it up almost entirely.

However, I am not displeased with some things that I have written, especially the first chapter, in which we find Camille at eleven years old, still trapped in Guise, on the brink of entering Louis-le-Grand on scholarship.

In any case, I posted this chapter (about 10 pp., single-spaced, Microsoft Word) in my journal, if you care to give it a read. I spent no little amount of time on it, so it should be worth your while, I should hope, at least for the language and style. Biographically, I was using Jacques Janssens’ brilliant text as my source of fact--the Prince of Condé episode is entirely rooted in truth (ear-pulling and all), while the Jean-Baptiste story is my own imaginative addition. I took pains to include all the Desmoulins family members, at least in passing.

Feedback would be appreciated, but mostly I just hope that you enjoy it.

Recommend me good books, please? <33


I am terribly craving for history books. And my mom also wants me to make a huge list of books, but I don't know what else to put there - I have so little, so far! And I really feel like reading, what, fifteen books from here to the end of summer!
I really want books that are related to the eras I like (and that this community has to do with). That is, Baroque, Georgian, Victorian, Edwardian eras, etc. I want books that are mostly about fashion and lifestyle of, but I also like good mystery, vampire, super-really-morbid and erotic novels that have to do with the eras I like. Since this community only has to do with the French revolution, I'd appreciate it if you recommended me any novel or book that has to do with it.
If you're knowledgeable in books and/or give me your input in this, I'd greatly appreciate it! Thank you so much!


Soon to be x-posted to a bazillion communities.

The last Humanité "portrait" requested. (I may translate a few of my own choosing as well, or if anyone has any more requests...) As the title of this post indicates, it's on Couthon. This one is a bit more... literary, than the others. Which is unsurprising, given that the author also wrote a novel about Couthon's son, Antoine. Needless to say, this is what he means when he says the "knows" him, not that he's secretly 200 years old.

So, without further ado:

 

( Couthon is an Old Comrade. )

Another translation of a "portrait" from Humanité. This time of Saint-Just.

( Louis-Antoine Saint-Just, Conscience of the Revolution )

I've just seen the TV adaptation of Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic / The Light Fantastic, and was amused to see that they'd given Vetinari (just called 'The Patrician'in this story) the inevitable little round tinted 'dictator' glasses. If you don't know the books, Vetinari is a sort of goodie - Pratchett described him as a mixture of 'Robespierre and Machiavelli', but I think he meant that in a good way - but I haven't noticed any mention of little round tinted dictator glasses in the books...

http://cgi.ebay.com/OOP-HERON-FRENCH-TAROT-DE-LA-REVOLUTION-RARE-CARDS-DECK_W0QQitemZ330358558848QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item4ceae79080&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14


Just in case anyone was stuck on what to give their hard-to-buy-for French Gypsy cousin for their birthday.

Since i'm a poet by some nature..I decided i should share my latest one. It's mostly about Maxime and St. Just in a kind of vague way.

xD

I hope you like it!

( Poetry this way.. )

Hello there, Revolution-lovers. I am living in Paris for the next four months (oh, yes) in the 17e arr., and for now I got the time to partially see the Parc Monceau, and on my way there, the famous Lycée Carnot in front of which Pierre Chaunu needs to spit every time he passes in front of it -- or so he says.

Today, I ventured to discover the Rue Saint-Just of Paris:



Here comes the joke about it -- prepare to laugh: I really love how it's a tiny, ridiculously tiny street almost out of the "walls" of Paris, that there's nothing worth seeing, and not even actual houses, and that it also happens to be connected to the "Avenue du cimetière des Battignoles". Oh, yes, because not only is it a dead-end, but it leads to a cemetary and all the addresses at the street are thus cemetary-related businesses:








No kidding.

Flowers for the dead, undertakers, marble for the tombstones and vaults, burial maintenance. Oh, the joke. Saint-Just appreciates the macabre humour, guys. It's really subtle. Subtler than that, you're called Simon Schama. Someone lol'ed himself to death when he gave him that street. Seriously. I'd like to see the minutes of the council that decided to attribute him that street... At least Robespierre's got a métro station, even if it's technically outside the 'walls' of Paris! Still better a métro station in a communist commune than a macabre intramuros street...

I think I stayed just two minutes on the actual street, because it was really almost, well, like they say la zone. It was really lost, and there were random people staring at me oddly or angrily or wtf-y, probably wondering why I was taking photos of the entrance of the cemetary, of the tiny businesses, and of the street panels, because none of them probably know who poor Saint-Just is.


--And, erm, because it just had to happen, as I was walking back the Avenue de Clichy to get the farthest from there, that's what I found:



Ooooooooooooooh dear. Now that's more of that same humour, isn't it? Oh dear.

The first of my translations of the Humanité mini-biographies, as requested by trf_chan.

The rest will be forthcoming, though probably not soon because I have a paper to write.

( Prieur de la Marne. )</div></div>

I'm doing this for one of my friends, as she just found out about the glorious Saint-Just (after a long texting session xD); So therefore, i need some suggestions as to the books that i can give to her.

Any books about him, please? S'il te plait? xD

thanks anyhow ^^

We got em! In answer to the previous post (sorry, I don't seem able to stick a picture into a post on that discussion thread), here's a panel from the French comic 'Requiem Chevalier Vampire' Tome 1. Guess who's a vampire in vampire world! Yeah, you guessed right.


As far as I know, it's just this one panel, though I haven't read the rest of the comics/BDs yet

"Le vaisseau de la Révolution ne peut arriver à bon port que sur un mer rougie par des torrents de sang" 

Does anyone know if this quote is
1) historical of fictional (Büchner's) . If real when it was pronounced?
2) If it's real, is it Saint-Just's or Barère's?

"Une nation ne se regénère que sur des monceaux de cadavre."
And what about his one? Is its only source a Thermidorian satirical play, again? The one in which it's attributed, as maelicia has found out, to a mysterious friend of Saint-Just?

Because it is often attributed to Saint-Just, too. It's astonishing; as if Saint-Just hadn't left to posterity enough gory quotes, the anti-revolutionary propagandists must invent new ones :D

Well, that's not serious historiography at all. According to George Henry Lewes, Vilate contributes the first quote to Barère and the second one to Saint-Just and they are supposed to have said it at a private dinner during Marie-Antoinette's process. Has anyone read Vilate? So, did Barère say his bloody quote in the Convention or at a dinner with his CPS buddies? Did he say it at all? Oh dear.



Thanks for help!