Welcome to 1789...

Does it piss anybody else off that he's often portrayed as a blood-crazed murderer?

Edited Date: 2010-05-03 02:27 pm (UTC)

(deleted comment)

From:

celine-carol.livejournal.com

Hm... I'm by no means an expert on the topic, but from what I've read, most seem to agree that (at the very least) he was a bit delusional, and honestly thought he was protecting the people by executing traitors (you know, executing one so many might live sort-of-thing). I tend to think that he was a bit delusional, but that by-and-large not nearly as bad as people make him out to be; I mean, contrary to what a lot of things seem to say, he wasn't a dictator... People voted for him and with him to get policies across, so his sentiments (paranoia?) were definitely shared by others. After all, the Terror kept going after Robespierre's death.

Just out of curiosity, how does the blood-crazed murderer amuse you? (I personally find his forgetfulness to be quite adorable).

From:

I am sorry but this reveals a pretty simplistic vision of how things actually worked during the French Revolution, how the power was exercise and how individuals influenced collective decision-making process.

From:

celine-carol.livejournal.com

This may be a bit of a silly question, but was that in response to my comment or the original (sorry, at first glance it seemed to be about what I wrote...if not, then sorry to bug you...)?

From:

No, celine, it was a response to slowpunk's comment, not to yours ;-)

From:

Definitely not a blood-crazed one - his method of murder is very detached, and it is generally believed that he thought honestly of his methods.

Insane, perhaps, but his voting in was democratic, and he wasn't a dictator.

From:

Just a murderer? De grâce, grant him at least the due title of mass-murdering Omnicidal Maniac (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OmnicidalManiac) with a Suicidal Cosmic Temper Tantrum (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SuicidalCosmicTemperTantrum)! He wanted to depopulate France! Then All Of The World! To guillotine all of it! They just didn't want to read The Social Contract. :( (Not that anybody cares of the other books. But those who will tell you this ~~complete utter nonsense~~ serious and truthful fact unfortunately only know that one book written by Rousseau. ~~The losers.~~) They just didn't want to like it as much as he did. :( Oh, well: at least then he could make himself shorts out of all the corpses! Or eat them. Or drink their blood. And he could stop the crops from growing too! And he was green! :D

؟؟؟ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_mark)

Edited Date: 2010-05-24 06:39 pm (UTC)

(deleted comment)

From:

So, if some event of history were to terrorise in the name of a virtue that you agree with, it wouldn't be murder?

You really can't just pick and choose whom you see as a murderer like that - either the massacre of civilians is murder by group, or it isn't. The consensus is that it isn't murder, it's a policy of eliminationism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliminationism).

Edited Date: 2010-05-27 06:42 am (UTC)

From:

The first part is my point as well. Which I will develop once my the heat-and-insomnia-induced migraines go away. However,

Eliminationism is the belief that one's political opponents are "a cancer on the body politic that must be excised — either by separation from the public at large, through censorship or by outright extermination — in order to protect the purity of the nation".

Although most of everybody (who usually hate the French Revolution and are determined to see it as a monstrous atrocity on the historical timeline) would jump on the occasion to say the French Revolution used the metaphor "a cancer on the body politic that must be excised" -- and yes they did use it a lot -- I would argue that it's really associated with 18th century philosophical and political speech, that it's entirely part of their entire culture, and that they were doing it for the triumph of the revolutionary principles, which are based on human rights.

You see where this discussion becomes a slippery slide.

Moreover, that term seems to apply to ethnic genocides, which they call "cleansing the purity of the nation", and so that makes me really wince if applied to the Fr Rev.

I get your point though that if someone really wants to be a nit-picky basher of the Fr Rev, it shouldn't be called murder, but this.

From:

Hmm.

I've read the work in which it was first used, and he was talking specifically about how the Nazis first considered the Jews political enemies before a policy of ethnic cleansing was even thought of - as Robespierre and co. considered counter-revolutionaries. The article I linked isn't exactly the best source - but I lack a copy of the book to reference /o\

It is an icky thought, I agree - but I can completely see how "cleansing the body politic" for the eventual spread of liberty can be related back to a sort of "purity of the nation".

Why would people see the Fr. Rev as a monstrosity on the historical timeline? That opinion befuddles me.

Edited Date: 2010-05-28 01:46 am (UTC)

From:

1. Yeah, I read that sort of argument often. One compares Louis XVI to the Jews. I profoundly disagree, on an emotional, rational and ideological level. For one thing, the reason Jews might have been seen as political enemies before ethnical enemies (I'm not convinced; also the two merged) was because they were likened to communists. Domenico Losurdo explains how the nazis saw communism as an "oriental ideology", like the Jews were "oriental". Russians, Jews, communism (read, pretty much anything on the left though) -- all the same.

The reason I disagree is that D. Losurdo traces back that sort of "application of ethnical characteristics to the leftist enemy" back in the 19th century and up to the Counter-Revolution itself and the Royalist writers. The poor were seen as another race in the 19th century. Would the systematic murderous onslaught on the poor working class by savage capitalism through the 19th century be ever called an "ethnic cleansing"? Of course not. Think why. We all know why. Moreover, the way the Jacobins were described in the 19th century is in direct filiation with how the Communists were by the nazis/various right wing movevements. The only characteristics that comes to my mind is the whole "they think ABSTRACT": accusation sent to philosophers, Jacobins, marxists/communists and Jews. Add in there freemasons, various left movements, feminists and lgbt advocates or else, and you've got everything that stirs up la bête immonde.

So all of this sums up to a "who started it all?" debate, and the only reason anyone generally pursues to bring an answer to this debate isn't to enlighten the process, but to take an ideological side. Also, the whole "The Jacobins All Started It; It's All Their Fault" is more and more sounding to my ears as a "The Victim Started It All; It's All The Victim's Fault" sort of reasoning that never takes into consideration the real causes that made fascism/nazism possible in the 1930s, in a country like Germany for example where the left was developed and active and where women and homosexuals rights were very advanced and organized (http://www.workers.org/ww/2004/prideseries0701.php).

Which wasn't the case for the Terror. Context =/= not the same at all.

However, if anyone really wants to see embryonic fascism in the French Revolution, without any ethnical motivation, one should rather look for the horrors that happened during the Thermidorian Reaction and especially the White Terror. Unsurprisingly, nobody cares about it, or thinks the Jacobins just asked for it.

To conclude this point, because I disgress, those who link it all back to the French Revolution -- or worse, some blame the whole Enlightenment!! -- and see obviously only the radical currents to be blamed is an ideological diversion to maintain conservatism. Moreover, saying radical social changes lead to nazism!! is precisely the reaction that lead to it in the first place. >:( It's like that idiotic loser here who says Hitler and the Nazis were gay and that's Really The Cause To Everything (http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/afas-fischer-outdoes-himself), or masculinists who use "feminazi" to call feminists.

2. "cleansing the body politic" =/= "purity of the nation". I'm pretty sure no one ever equals Catherine de Médicis or Isabella of Castile to "Nazi concepts". (Odd though, because they're women and rulers, so you'd think there'd be some huge bashing taking place. Alas, I don't see it explained quite this way. Though there is bashing.)

The Nazis were the response to the French Revolution (they opposed themselves specifically to it and to erase what it had accomplished); the French Revolution was the response to the Religion Wars. Atrocities are often answered with atrocities. And more. And then more again. Because in History, people always resist, while others always crush them. It's sad, depressing, horrible, etc.

From:

Would the systematic murderous onslaught on the poor working class by savage capitalism through the 19th century be ever called an "ethnic cleansing"? Of course not. Think why. We all know why.

Well, even though the same thing is still occurring both inside and outside the rich-world, I'd call it something, as an anarcho-communist who advocates capitalism's end.

Anyway.

I think we are talking over each other, in that I meant only to offer

slowdeath an alternative term to 'murder'. Though the original author used it in terms of tracing the history of anti-Leftism in the context of the Nazi regime, I felt that it was fitting enough to refer to the actions of the politically motivated Jacobins acting on their fears of liberty's end. It did not refer to them as proto-fascists, only to their actions in specifically attacking people as enemies of the proto-state. Perhaps co-opting the term from scholars of WW2 may bring with it that idea, but that's a linguistic debate.

The idea that the Jacobins were not responsible for their actions of (the first) Terror is patronising, and leaves the Left open to an assault on our morals -- how are our ideas better when our methods are just as violent? There is a definite difference in blaming a person for sequential actions and taking responsibility for actions which were not in the best interest or even the best moments of people.

From:

3. Because conservative jerks see and state (although with less straight-to-the-point details) that the "problem" of the French Revolution was the failure of the first elite that sparked it -- i.e. liberal nobility and high bourgeoisie -- to keep the control of it and to contain the social explosion, which is what Furet calls the dérapage of the Revolution and dates it to... the proclamation of the Declaration of Rights of August 1789. The elites thought that granting it would calm down the country: it did not.

Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions may be founded only upon the general good.

Everybody stopped reading after the first sentence of course: everything necessary was there to make the Revolution the one of the petit-bourgeois, the peasants, the workers -- and yes, the women's and the black (slaves)'s too.

The conservative rightist Thermidorians knew it. By Year III, they took off from their re-made Declaration that first article, what makes the Revolution being the Revolution, and Boissy d'Anglas stated it was the source of all the "anarchy" that had prevailed for the five first years.

To sum up, the French Revolution, through the "failure" of the elites, sparked two hundred years of social unrest which pisses off the Old, Rich, White Men (and their allies who have privileges to gain through that power structure).

Because conservative jerks are often the frank enemies: like when Chaunu calls abortion the "White Plague".

That's why people hate the French Revolution. Because not everybody likes "those filthy *insert your choice of minority here*" to be their equals.

tl;dr: 1. Domenico Losurdo: Freemasons, Philosophers, Jacobins, Socialists, Marxists, Anarchists, Communists, Jews = here goes one big group of "Those Evil Others Wrecking Our Social Order" to ponder about, the other is straight from the Counter-Revolution through Fascism/Nazism, by passing through Maurras; 2. Large-scale atrocities cause traumas in the human society on the whole or in one or many groups and when not healed properly might lead to other atrocities as a response to the first trauma: my Ethical Humanist Conscience is horrified by this, but my Ruthless Avenger Of Oppressions Conscience is much less, so I'm very conflicted on this, as much as when I watch Inglourious Basterds; 3. conservative jerks are assholes who'd obviously hate the Fr Rev that took away the privileges they'd otherwise be securely enjoying without protest or any source of it.

Edited Date: 2010-05-28 04:51 am (UTC)

From:

It's getting quite boring, this selective approach.
There was as much place for the counter-revolutionaries in the France of 1973, attacked from everywhere, its capital threatened with complete destruction, as there was a place for Hitler's active supporters in London during the WW II bombing. There are limits to a legitimate opposition. Only recognizing this we may talk about the terror and its crimes. But I cannot accept the comparison to genocide or that empty category of eliminationism.
Leaving aside the assumption that in the European continent people could have achieved freedom and self-government without a fight. Oh yeah, we have seen the willingness of the absolutist at the Congress of Vienna, haven't we?

(deleted comment)

From:

I always thought of sarcasm as a very good method of argumentation when the argumentation ground of the debate was rather lacking in the opponent party, especially when the original argument of said party consists in the contradiction:

- Robespierre was a murderer
- Robespierre amuses me.

Without any evidence or explanation but murderers being obviously funny, har har har.

From:

Yes. Highly.

From:

Yay, I'm not alone! And I started some chatter, double yay!

From:

This is... broad. Perhaps it might help in future to have slightly more narrowed down discussion questions...?

In any case, I could talk about Robespierre at Louis-le-Grand, if anyone's interested, since I'm currently writing a paper on the Université de Paris.

From:

celine-carol.livejournal.com

I'd definitely be interested.. haven't seen much about that period of his life

From:

I could talk about Robespierre at Louis-le-Grand.

Yes, immensely so. Specifically what he was likely to be reading or studying. Very specifically, would he have been able to get his mits on Plutarch's writings on women like:

So it is ridiculous to maintain that women have no participation in virtue. What need is there to discuss their prudence and intelligence, or their loyalty and justice, when many women have exhibited a daring and great-hearted courage which is truly masculine?

Sorry, biological determinism is my pet skeeve at the moment, and I run into the Erotikus almost by accident, and then I couldn't help thinking, goodness I wonder if Robespierre read that. From it's title it doesn't seem like the sort of book they'd be encouraging boys to read.

I'm not going to do anything as horrible as turn Robespierre into a teenage feminist, I was just thinking, well, was there a moment when the idea that humanity was mutable became real?

From:

According to L.W.B. Brockliss, who along with Dominique Julia, seems to be the main scholar of secondary and higher education in late 18th century France, "In Greek most students would only have read extracts from Aesop, Lucian, Homer, and Demosthenes. The first was read in the lower classes (if texts were studied), Lucian in the third and second, and the last two in the rhetoric. If alternatives were used at all, the list would primarily have comprised the Greek New Testament (either the Gospels or Acts) for beginners, Xenophon's Cyropaedia in the second (an appropriate choice), and a speech by Isocrates in the rhetoric, usually the Ad Nicoclen. Lucian and Homer were always on the textual menu, the first generally studied through the Dialogue of the Dead, the latter through several books of the Iliad or Odyssey. [...] Above all, no one would have had the opportunity to read the Greek historians and dramatists, except occasionally the odd life of Plutarch (1).

(1) In 1727 Rollin claimed that exercises on Plutarch were common and one exists for the Coll. de Beauvais from 1712; Plutarch was also set on several occasions for the Paris agrégation and was definitely read at Sorrèze [...]" - Brockliss, French Higher Education in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries: A Cultural History

In other words, if he read Plutarch in school at all, it would have been one of his lives. (And he almost certainly read all of them later, whether in Greek or in translation.) To answer the question of whether he could ever have read the Erotikus, I would say it depends on how good his Greek was and/or whether there was a translation available. We know he knew Greek, but students had to be much less proficient in it than Latin, so he might not have been at the level where doing extracurricular reading in Greek would be very enjoyable. Still, you never know.

In any case, Teenage Feminist!Robespierre would be some kind of superhero. An inaccurate one, but it amuses me none the less. XD;

From:

Thank you! Thank you for the prize list too.

In Greek most students would only have read extracts from Aesop, Lucian, Homer, and Demosthenes.

What no Plato? They didn't study Plato? Or am I getting this stupidly wrong?

In any case, Teenage Feminist!Robespierre would be some kind of superhero. An inaccurate one, but it amuses me none the less. XD

I realy like the idea of inaccurate superhero!Robespierre. Really, he could turn up mysteriously wherever acts of social injustice are taking place and fight the oppressors with his ninja-legal aid lawyer skills and superior reason. Or something, as long as he didn't have to run fast or shoot straight. He's even got the absent-minded cover-persona, the geeky glasses and the animal side-kick. Yes, yes, it is late, very late I should probably lie down, but why should the Royalists get all the inaccurate superhero fun?...sorry about that.

From:

You're welcome.

Apparently not. At least, Brockliss doesn't mention him. Odd, isn't it?

That would be adorable. If I had more skill with that kind of thing, I would totally make a comic out of that.

From:

I'll add more when I've written my paper(s), but since it's Robespierre's birthday today - Joyeux anniversaire, Maxime ! - I thought I'd give a small preview of things to come in the form of prizes he won at Louis-le-Grand in the competition that took place among the ten major collèges of the Université de Paris (of which Louis-le-Grand was one, after the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1762).

Maximilianus Maria Isidorus de Robespierre
Atrebas (né à Arras)
e collegio Ludovici Magni

Maximilien Marie Isidore de Robespierre
Atrebas (born in Arras)
From the collège Louis-le-Grand

Concours de 1771
Classe de quatrième
6e accessit de version latine

Competition of 1771
Class of the Fourth [Robespierre entered Louis-le-Grand in the Fifth but won no prize that year. The easiest class was the Seventh, then the Sixth, and so on to the Second. Students in these classes were called Grammarians. Next came Rhetoric, and then Philosophy, which included Math, Physics, Logic, Metaphysics and Ethics. This is where secondary education ended. Students could then go on to study Theology, Medicine or Law. Robespierre chose the latter--to clarify, not all scholarships allowed students to choose; some only covered one or two of the higher faculties, most often Theology.]
8th prize - Latin translation [I translate both prix and accessit as prize, but the latter really means honorable mention. There were only two prizes awarded, after which honorable mentions began. Thus, the 1st accessit is really the equivalent of 3rd prize and I've made that calculation here. All prizes for translation are from the language specified into French.]

Concours de 1772
Classe de quatrième (vétérans)
2e prix de thème latin
6e accessit de version latine

Competition of 1772
Class of the Fourth (veterans) [Repeating classes does not always indicate failure the first time around. Students repeated classes (especially rhetoric, but also others, as can be seen here) for a variety of reasons, typically most importantly because a given subject was important to them and they wanted to make sure they had as firm a grounding as possible in it. Students would have to repeat classes if they did not pass the exams given at the end of each year, as in the case of Larevellière-Lepeaux, who had to repeat his Second before he could move on to Rhetoric for that reason, but given that Robespierre had won a prize the first time around, this does not seem to be case here.]
2nd prize - Latin theme [A composition in Latin on a given topic.]
8th prize - Latin translation

Concours de 1774
Classe de seconde
4e accessit de vers latins
4e accessit de version latine

Competition of 1774 [Robespierre won no prizes in the Third]
Class of the Second
6th prize - Latin verse [Students would have to take a Latin prose piece and recompose it into verse, poetically and in keeping with the meter]
6th prize - Latin translation

Concours de 1775
Classe de rhétorique (nouveaux)
2e prix de vers latins
2e prix de version latine
4e accessit de version grecque

Competition of 1775
Rhetoric Class (new students)
2nd prize - Latin verse
2nd prize - Latin translation
6th prize - Greek translation

Concours de 1776
Classe de rhétorique (vétérans)
3e accessit de version latine.

Competition of 1776
Rhetoric Class (veterans)
5th prize - Latin translation

From:

For purposes of comparison, here are the prizes won by some contemporaries:

Joannes Maria Hérault de Séchelles
Parisinus
ex Harcurio (collège d'Harcourt)
(Hérault de Séchelles, le conventionnel)

Jean-Marie Hérault de Séchelles
Parisian
From the collège d'Harcourt
(Hérault de Séchelles, the member of the Convention)

Concours de 1770
Classe de trosième
4e accessit de vers latins

Competition of 1770
Class of the Third
6th prize - Latin verse

Concours de 1771
Classe de seconde
2e prix de version latine

Competition of 1771
Class of the Second
2nd prize - Latin translation

Andreas Maria de Chénier
Constantinopolitanus
e Regia Navarra (collège de Navarre)

André-Marie de Chénier
Born in Constantinople
From the collège de Navarre

Concours de 1778
Classe de rhétorique (nouveaux)
1er prix de discours français
1er accessit de version latine

Competition of 1778 [Someone who knows more about Chénier will have to let us know whether the reason we have only prizes for one year is because this is the only year he attended collège in Paris, or whether he attended other years without winning anything - which seems unlikely, given his success in the year we do have information for.]
Rhetoric Class (new students)
1st prize - French discourse
3rd prize - Latin translation

Lucius Simplicius Camilla Benedictus des Moulins
Guisius Laudunensis (né à Guise)
e collegio Ludovici Magni

Lucien-Simplice-Camille-Benoist Desmoulins
Born in Guise
From the collège Louis-le-Grand

Concours de 1774
Classe de cinquième
2e prix de version latine

Competition of 1774
Class of the Fifth
2nd prize - Latin translation

Concours de 1775
Classe de quatrième
2e prix de thème latin
1er prix de version latine

Competition of 1775
Class of the Fourth
2nd prize - Latin theme
1st prize - Latin translation

Concours de 1778
Classe de rhétorique
9e accessit de discours français

Competition of 1778
Rhetoric Class
11th prize - French discourse

Edited Date: 2010-05-07 02:10 am (UTC)

From:

Chénier was born in Constantinople?

From:

Yeah. His father was a merchant there, apparently.

From:

Cool.

From:

Oops, I forgot the source. Here it is now: http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k61457h.image.hl.r=laur%C3%A9ats+concours+1747+1793+.f271.langFR

From:

Robespierre was supposed to present his essay of 1775 to the king and queen, wasn't he? Do you have any info on what his translation was?

I'm curious, now that you've posted all that research :)

From:

Actually, it was a Latin address composed by his professor, according to Proyart, the source for that anecdote, and considering this took place in 1775, we can know more specifically that it was by Hérivaux, the professor of rhetoric.

From:

Just out of interest, how reliable is Proyart as a source for Robespierre's childhood/ schooldays? It seems to get quoted a lot, although possibly because nothing else is available, but it's very obviously wildly inaccurate about his adult life?

Also where is that portrait of mini-Robespierre from?

Sorry to ask you more questions at such a busy time for you.

From:

The reason we use Proyart is that, apart from official records and Charlotte's memoirs, it's the only real source we have. And Proyart is more accurate than Charlotte, generally, because he was actually there and Charlotte wasn't. (For example, Charlotte translates "Maximilien was good in school" into "he almost always won first prize," which, as we can see from the official records, is just not true.) Still, it's best when we can corroborate what Proyart says. (We can't, I don't think, for the incident where he reads the address to the king, but most historians think it's accurate because being chosen to do that reflects rather well on Robespierre and Proyart probably wouldn't have made it up for that reason. In any case, I could be wrong that it's not corroborated elsewhere...)

I'm actually not sure where the original of the portrait of Robespierre as a child is from. I've seen it in books and around the internet, but I don't recall seeing a source. Which is frustrating, but what can you do?

Don't worry about the questions; I just finished my last exam and once I'm done revising my paper tomorrow, I'll be done for the year.

From:

I'm actually not sure where the original of the portrait of Robespierre as a child is from. I've seen it in books and around the internet, but I don't recall seeing a source.

The only attribution I've seen was in a dodgy 19th Century googlebook which says "from a portrait by Boze" which seems wrong for various reasons - I wondered if was an attempt by someone to imagine a young Robespierre from the Boze painting.

This book also states that Robespierre did not live at LLG while taking his degree, but got a evening job doing legal copyist work, which paid for digs and nice hair, giving Hamel as a source. I have to admit, I'm rather fond of Robespierre working through college, but I've never seen it mentioned anywhere else, so I assume it is bunk. Any idea if there's any truth in ramen noodle Robespierre?

most historians think it's accurate because being chosen to do that reflects rather well on Robespierre and Proyart probably wouldn't have made it up for that reason.

And it would have been a fairly audacious thing to make up, I suppose. There'd have been plenty of other people around who would remember that particular event.

I just finished my last exam and once I'm done revising my paper tomorrow, I'll be done for the year.

Congratulations!

From:

That seems unlikely to me; Boze did paint an early portrait of Robespierre before his official training began, but Robespierre was already in his twenties when he posed for it, and it's much less skillfully execuated than the child Robespierre portrait.

Robespierre was definitely living at Louis-le-Grand while he studied law. It was stipulated in his scholarship. However, it's entirely likely that he apprenticed - for lack of a better word - with a practicing lawyer, as this was permitted and even encouraged for law students. Hamel is actually not a bad source, since he often quotes from primary sources that one would otherwise have to dig through an archive to find.

I agree, there were still plenty of people living who could have invalidated Proyart's statement if it were false. On the other hand, though, some pretty audacious lying about facts that people were around to remember was going on c. 1795. (Still, I don't think Proyart's lying here. It just wouldn't make any sense.)

Congratulations!
Thanks! :D

From:

Edit: Ughhh. When you said "portrait", I thought you all meant the descriptive portrait, not the painting. Sorry. Got confused since you were talking of Proyart. :/

I'm actually not sure where the original of the portrait of Robespierre as a child is from. I've seen it in books and around the internet, but I don't recall seeing a source. Which is frustrating, but what can you do?

I might be ready to make an answer on this, but it's basic -- because obviously I haven't yet read so many freaking sources of 400 pages and what more!!1! /insanity.

As I see it from my corpus (which is quite ~~too~~ spread), the childhood part stems from the "biographical/historical genre", which during the Thermidorian Reaction is mainly Montjoie and Proyart. This genre seems to have evolved from the portraits: L. Duperron begins with a few very simple phrases on Robespierre's youth, but not any more, and it's basic.

It seems a lot more came later in the late 1820s -- yes, from Charlotte, but also from Charles Reybaud and Laignelot (who was close to Robespierre) who participated in writing the Mémoires authentiques de Robespierre (which are obviously not). There's only two volumes of those, and they're mostly on Robespierre's childhood and youth. I think it builds up to the États Généraux and that's all. Sergio Luzzatto (author of Mémoire de la Terreur) explains that Charlotte, even if she denied her participation to it, must have had given some details, because those present in the Mémoires authentiques weren't known yet (and I assume show up in Charlotte's own memoirs).

Apart from this, a lot seems to be copy/pasted from narratives around the "poor, envious and frustrated child grows into rebellious leader/assassin" trope. Now, that genre is rather vast.

I wonder if you could find the same sort of stuff written on Cromwell...

Edited Date: 2010-05-24 05:52 pm (UTC)

From:

Merci! I appreciated you taking the time out to answer me, out of what must be a hectic schedule :D

From:

You're quite welcome.

From:

acolnahuacatl.livejournal.com

ITT: MAXIME AND MARAT. DISCUSS.

.... I'm actually quite curious. Broad topic is broad and can be interpreted anyway you like /is opening a Pandora's box ffffff--

From:

It's a rather complicated topic, but to cut a very long story short (which I unfortunately have to, for the moment), I think it would be most accurate to say they had a grudging respect for one another.

From:

acolnahuacatl.livejournal.com

From: