Welcome to 1789...

Sorry, I don't know of a full account, but Barere wrote memoirs that were translated into English not long after they came out - if you have a good university library they may have them - and Fatimahcrossin posted a link to Billaud-Varenne's memoirs a few posts ago - I have no idea if either cover the Danton trial, though! The only accounts I've come across (e.g. Norman Hampson's Life and Opinions of Maximilien Robespierre, which has several pages on the backstage machinations, with sources listed) are pieced together from anecdotes. Robespierre's contribution to Saint-Just's speech is well documented in Mathiez and others, but I'm assuming that's one of the primary sources you already have. (The only biog of Danton I've read is Hilaire Belloc's, and that's so old the author himself admits his reasearch was outdated by the time the second edition came out!)

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Thanks. I've come to find it ironic that it is easier to find relatively irrelevant details about what went on that night (like Saint-Just getting angery and throwing his hat in the fire) but very little about the substantive issues discussed beyond the fact that they knew what they were doing was dangerous and there was some controversy. But that seems a common irony in the study of history, particularly when the groups in question made a point of not keeping records of their proceedings.

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Have you seen Wajda's rather right-wing adaptation of Przbyszewska's left-wing play? Your hat comment reminded me of this essay about it by Robert Darnton http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:Xpamx6RNTr4J:digitalhistory.concordia.ca/courses/hist306f07/files/darnton.pdf+new+york+darnton+double-entendre&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&client=safari (though I think the hat burning is relevant, if true, for what it reveals about Saint-Just of the supposedly unrufflable cool - and the astonishing risk he seems to have been prepared to take, in initially planning to read the accusation with Danton present and not-yet-arrested!)

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Okay, Darnton is officially off my list of not-horrible American historians. That's one of the more insulting articles I've read on the subject--it's not wrong of Wajda to completely screw up historical facts, it's wrong of his critics to mention it! Glad we cleared that up.

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I still like Darnton, but he's touching on an interesting subject here without understanding the depths of passion - I presume he's writing from the comfort of a university chair (and with no war experience), and he's a cultural historian - more, hmm, that's interesting! rather than having the passions of a political historian: to him, European postwar politics are just another interesting phenomenon to go 'hmm!' over, in a patronising way.

I do find it odd and worrying (if comments on this site are anything to go by) that Wajda's Danton is used as a teaching aid in schools/universities. When it came out, the impression I got was that it was received as a film more about 1983 than 1794. Wajda said the same, and in the pressbook (which Darnton doesn't quote) discusses the swinging pendulum of side-taking between communist -leaning historians and the right, very conscious that his film will be located in that 'tradition'. The (Polish) Pope beatified 99 Vendee 'martyrs' not long afterwards (how's that for timing?) It reminds me of the same sort of story told about postwar europe in 'Who Paid The Piper?' - Darnton scratches the surface here but doesn't see deeper, though he was writing in 84: by 89 the concerted effort to prevent the bicentennary being a rallying point for communism was clearer.

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I've liked what he's written about pre-Revolutionary France, I'll admit (The Great Cat Massacre, The Forbidden Bestsellers of Pre-Revolutionary France), but I really think he should stick to that, since he doesn't seem to understand the Revolution, its historiography, or modern France on a very profound level. (And yet it seems as if he thinks he does, which is almost worse!)

to him, European postwar politics are just another interesting phenomenon to go 'hmm!' over, in a patronising way.
You've touched on the reason I rarely trust Americans to write about France. In some parts of the article, it seems to me, the tone even veers from patronising to contemptuous.

Really, I think it's a terrible idea to try to use any film to teach history, but if you're going to do that, seriously, pick a film that is really about the period you're teaching about (and doesn't have glaring historical inaccuracies, unless the point of watching the film is to point them out). Maybe it would be a good film to show if you were teaching about Poland in the 1980s, but France in the 1790s?

And I must say I find the revisionist assumption that only Communists could possibly support the Revolution insulting--though I know it's part of their larger agenda to discredit the Revolution entirely.

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And I must say I find the revisionist assumption that only Communists could possibly support the Revolution insulting--though I know it's part of their larger agenda to discredit the Revolution entirely.

I agree with you that this is a trend, but I don't think it is necessarily the result of intentional vindictiveness so much as the apparently dominant societal outlook on politics and history. Essentially, there seems a trend to view a focus on political abstractions or idealism with a certain degree of contempt, as though too great an interest in them is foolish, immature, or dangerous. Therefore, I think there is a tendency to right of the revolutionaries from the start as silly dreamers or dangerous radicals for what they believed and wanted to achieve rather than for what they actually ended up doing.

That said, if you want to see a true example of academic vindictiveness (and, in my opinion, dishonesty), look up a NY Times book review of Andress' The Terror and Scurr's Fatal Purity. He takes a line that in context is rather benign and quotes it out of context to imply that the whole premise of Fatal Purity is to defend and justify Robespierre--it's one thing to criticize Scurr's work by finding actual examples of her apologizing for Robespierre (and there are some), but to essentially create one's own examples implies one has an agenda beyond what should be acceptable in the study of history.

Sorry. I've digressed. I don't like seeing the honest understanding of a subject is made second to the politics of its study.

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Doubtless the majority of the revisionists are not in bad faith, but many have no qualms about falsification and distortion to support their claims and seem unable to resist the tossing-around of epithets. As to their contempt of idealism on the grounds of its danger and immaturity, I continue to fail to see how complacency, corruption, and compromising of principles is at all mature or safe.

Concerning Scurr's biography, I don't think anyone short of those responsible for putting a fanged Robespierre on the cover of the National Review for the bicentennial could find it an apology for Robespierre. Scurr claims in the beginning that she tries to be Robespierre's "friend," but by the time I finished reading it, I must say my thoughts were along the lines of "with friends like that, who needs enemies?"
(The reason I object to this is of course that people will, like that reviewer, be inclined to take her book as a defense, and then think: "See even his defenders don't see him in a particularly good light"--which shifts the center of the debate far into reactionary territory.)

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The quote that you mention--the one about being a "friend"--is actually the one to which I was alluding. I needn't elaborate very much to give you an idea of how the NY Times twisted that. But the NY Times book review is notoriously biased, so what can one expect?

What the more moderate revolutionaries found out is proving true for the more reasonable historians: being the voice of reason in the middle of a controversy is often the most dangerous position to take.

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Yes, I can see how easily that might have been twisted. And then, it's really a pity the NY Times in general is so biased on such subjects, especially as it's so widely trusted.

I would agree with that, but with one caveat, which is that the position of the voice of reason needn't necessarily--as many wrongly assume--be that which is squarely in the middle of the opposing sides.

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On your first comment above, the likes of John Gray? http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/jul/07/philosophy.politics . Horrible, keeps turning up in newspapers and political weeklies slagging off Jacobinism and Utopian idealists in general, and never lets small matters like 'facts' get in the way of his pontificating.

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I'm rather perplexed - I recently read that article in the context of Darnton's book The Kiss of Lamourette and found it quite interesting, harsh, but I didn't really find anything so objectionable about it. I don't know if it was because it was preceded by an essay on the significance of history in contemporary Poland (from which I gather that he did spend some time in Poland around the time all this was going on) and/or I was put at ease by his "open letter to a tv producer" which actually had me giggling aloud. ~~Or general good will because I was in Paris.~~ Well, I don't particularly have a clear opinion on any of it (I persist in thinking Danton is a fantastic film, if not a fantastic history, but I do find it fascinating to see how various people have reacted to it) - I just honestly don't find it so 'insulting' - perhaps because to me it seems broad enough that I'm not sure who it's insulting toward. Although I sort of see the "hmm, that's interesting!" point mentioned by

victoriavandal below, and maybe that's where the problem lies - I won't try to pretend I'm not rather naïve myself.

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The main problem I have with Danton is easily summed up: It has nothing to do with the Revolution as portrayed in reputable historical sources--and not just because it's really about Poland--but people think it does. If people realized that everyone and everything in it is not merely a caricature but a caricature of a caricature, then perhaps I wouldn't have such a problem. (Even in the play it's based on, it's clear the author didn't really understand the Revolution.) I've enjoyed some of Darnton's work, but I still can't help finding this essay, as

victoriavandal says, patronizing and even contemptuous of French historians of the Revolution, as well as French politicians, etc. On the other hand, it may be that I would feel differently about it if I read it in the context of his book, (though I must admit I doubt it).

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"Danton" and "Darnton" must stop being only one letter off from each other. It's making me confused.

Anyway, I agree with you on Danton. If I say I think it's brilliant it's more because - not that I know much about films, but - it's gorgeous and well-acted and really very clever - Wajda is definitely talented. But it does seem a little scary in retrospect that we watched it in 10th grade history. (It was actually what triggered my interest in the Revolution - so I guess I personally was not destroyed by being served Wajda in lieu of history - but so I also know what kind of impression it makes without any prior knowledge of the events!)
Ah, I think I understand better what you mean now. Right, I recall some that rubbing me the wrong way too. It does seem rather narrow-oversimplified (I expect there was a little more variation in opinions than that..) - and though of course I was not around to see what attitudes were like on the eve of the bicentennial, what he describes seems a bit.. contrary to other impressions? (It was a good book, though, by the way - I had never read Darnton and came across it by chance at the library. It's also full of deliciously nerdy stories about publishing during the Enlightenment.)

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Hm, perhaps I should have italicized Danton, or put it in quotes, to make it more obvious...? (Since, after all, we're talking about the film and not the personage.)

I can see how someone knowing nothing about the Revolution--or even someone who did know something and could put it out of their mind--could appreciate "Danton"'s qualities as a film, but personally, the mutilation of history was far too distracting for me to be able to do that. >.> In general though, I think the impression people get from watching "Danton" is too often their first and last, or close to it, so it's doubtless more damaging for your average person who doesn't take a particularly strong interest in the Revolution to watch it.

I suppose I shouldn't be too hard on Darnton in particular, since there are very few American historians who don't use that patronizing kind of tone when speaking of their European, and in particular, French colleagues. Nevertheless, it's definitely lowered him in my estimation, which is always disappointing. (Doubtless it is; nerdy details on publishing are Darnton's speciality. I just wish he would have stuck to it.)

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Haha, no, I should just learn to read.

Interestingly though - when I try to tap into my initial reactions to the film, knowing nothing of the Revolution - what I remember distinctly, which seems to disagree with what people say about it, is that I felt very sympathetic toward Robespierre - as in the scene when he's lying there sweating at the end; I think I came away with the impression that his was the character you could really understand in the end. (And I don't think it was some sort of intrinsic personal bias since I've often since been more inclined toward the Dantonists!) Obviously I don't want to suggest that everyone who sees it will share my impression; but at least I know it's possible - so I've wondered if it's primarily people who know the situation who see Robespierre as being so vilified in the film. That is quite a general statement and the reaction of a then-15-year-old american is not necessarily the best testimonial; but it would be interesting to see what the 'average person' really gets out of Danton. For myself, I've no idea exactly how I feel about it, but that's fine with me.

Yes. :( Well, I suppose I haven't yet discovered a historian for whom this was not the case. (If anyone has, I'm not sure whether I'll be impressed or wary.)

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Actually, I love the film 'Danton' as a film, as a piece of art. I saw it not too long after it came out, around the same time as seeing another version of the play on stage, and if Wajda's intention was to make me come down on the side of Dionysius and hate Apollo, West against East, then he screwed up - if anything, his Danton can be read as asking for it, more so than the historical record supports (in the film, he's clearly attempting a coup). I find the film mostly very nuanced, though - yes, there are some very heavy-handed scenes, particularly the closing scene (a swipe at Terreur et Vertu?) - but in the main I think enough of the play survives to make me happy. When I lend the DVD to friends I give them a lecture first, and I can be a real pain about it at dinner parties - "well, actually...." and go on about my theories of CIA manipulation of the run up to the bicentenary , but there've been times - specially a few years ago, when I used to be vaguely active in politics, when I've thought, holy cow, this is just like a scene from 'Danton'....
Maybe it's a girl thing? Maybe blokes watch and go, yeah, Danton's getting pissed and fucking whores, what a mensch!

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...Whoa whoa whoa, you've seen "The Danton Case" staged? How long was that?

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It was Pam Gems' adaptation, so not the full text, and I think it was heavily altered. I think the original play is pretty well unperformable as a straight play - it's written more like a dream, and I saw it in a proscenium arch theatre, when it would have been much better in a theatre-in-the-round type space, more intimate. I'm curious to know how Wajda staged his theatre version, and if he left it intact - ok, I don't know many Poles, but those I do all know her name well, and he said at the time what a respected literary figure she was by then.

Have you heard of the insane-sounding 5 hour musical play done in the late 80's, with James Marsters from 'Buffy' as Robespierre, who is shown screwing his sister or something like that? Gawd!

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It was Pam Gems' adaptation, so not the full text, and I think it was heavily altered. I think the original play is pretty well unperformable as a straight play - it's written more like a dream, and I saw it in a proscenium arch theatre, when it would have been much better in a theatre-in-the-round type space, more intimate.

Out of curiosity, how was the trial (if it was shown onstage) handled? If it's in there, I'd imagine it's hard to do convincingly...

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I'm afraid I can't remember! It was 20 years ago - I think they did do it onstage, on benches, but I can't remember anything more useful than that. It's offstage in the original play, (I think - god my memory!), but I've read a note that says Wajda's 70's stage production seated the Tribunal in the audience, so I presume, as with the film, he added it from the surviving trial notes.

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Do you mean Pam Gems' play "The Snow Palace"? Or did she actually do an adaptation of "The Danton Case"? Cause The Snow Palace is more about the life of Stanislawa Prz... herself. I read it and I have to say I didn't like it very much because I thought Gems really misunderstood Stanislawa Prz's relationship to her plays and characters. The "excerpts" of The Danton Case that made it into The Snow Palace were very different from the actual play.

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It was an adaptation of 'The Danton Case', called 'The Danton Affair', but I hadn't read the original play at the time and it's so long ago now since I saw it I can't remember how they compare, but I think it was quite heavily adapted. I haven't read 'the Snow Palace' yet but I'm interested to see what she did with it - it's such an unusual life I'm surprised it hasn't appealed to more dramatists, but as far as I know it's the only dramatisation (?). Hilary Mantel was going to do a novel, but (as with her mooted Marat one) I don't know if she ever did - her new one's about another chap who got beheaded on the 28th July - Thomas Cromwell...

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Rather belatedly, I've found the theatre programme - running time 3 hours 45 mins, including a 15 min interval! It was at the RSC, so long running times were normal: when they did shorter modern plays, you'd get a double or triple bill. The programme notes are actually very good (by which I mean accurate and leftish - the first page is entirely devoted to a fair sized chunk of the 'terror and virtue' speech, a lot more than you'd come across in a standard English-language history book), and, whilst my memory's not good enough to say how much, the writer says she followed the original play pretty closely: I only had Wajda's film to compare it to at the time, but it was definitely more 'feminine'. A version of Les Dieux ont Soif has just opened this week in London, called 'Liberty', but I don't think I want to pay £45 plus train fare to be told the revolution was bad! (and like the Bush administration!)

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That's more or less how I see it - although I suppose I don't have the same amount of background to go with it - I was honestly starting to think I was quite alone, ha. I'm still not sure what to make of the play (of course I have not seen it staged, and incidentally I have not seen la Terreur et la Vertu either, woe, these things are lost on me) - well, I don't recall it as well as Thermidor (I recall that I was reading it in a dentist's office though) but it was very strange, parts are utterly different from Danton and then you come across something that was obviously absorbed directly into the film. Oh dear, and now I can't remember where I was going with that, so I'll leave it there. Anyway, I don't think I have anything to add.
...you know, that must be it.

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(Even in the play it's based on, it's clear the author didn't really understand the Revolution.)

I've read a few excerpts from it (the ones I could get for free online) and some of the characterization is definitely strange, probably the result of the author's obsessive fixation with Robespierre that, to my understanding, is somewhat irrelevant to the real Robespierre. I read enough to realize I should not be reading this until I finish my current project researching the trial of the indulgents lest it influence my conclusions in strange ways...

It has nothing to do with the Revolution as portrayed in reputable historical sources...but people think it does. If people realized that everyone and everything in it is not merely a caricature but a caricature of a caricature, then perhaps I wouldn't have such a problem.
That seems to be the problem pretty much all historical fiction (and even some historical fact...) about the Revolution, or most of history. People tend to forget about the "fiction" part of "historical fiction" even though it is clearly stated in the title of the genre!

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I definitely recommend getting your hands on "The Danton Case" and "Thermidor" and reading them through. I do think they're overlooked masterpieces in the genre of Revolutionary fiction/drama. That said, they are products of their time and their author's rather bizarre personality. I recommend doing some research (or reading the wikipedia article, whatever) on the playwright before you read them, because it definitely puts them in context.

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Yeah, I love her - I just hope I don't turn into her!

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Just try to avoid the drugs and painting your food with lye...

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Well, the central heating here hasn't worked for years, so there's a start!

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I like a good part of Darnton's essay - I'm delighted he flags up stuff like the scene in David's studio, but towards the end he has the tone a bit like someone lifting up a stone and watching the ants scurry around, if you see what I mean. Academics love academic spats - but I didn't think he really appreciated that the political issues involved ran so deep in countries outside the 'iron curtain', too. Maybe that wasn't clear till the late 80's , though - Thatcherism and Reaganomics hadn't hit their stride by 1984.
I'd be interested to know if he (or anyone) has written at length on 'Pauvre Bitos', which is a thoroughly loathsome piece of work but I think says a hell of a lot about the times it was written in. In a way, I'm surprised, if Darnton's essay is accurate, that Robespierre was still being held in high esteem by Mitterand and co in the 80's, because I'd got the impression he kind of fell between two stools by that point - always loathed by the right, his 'purity' disconcerting to a somewhat tarnished section of the war generation, and the 68-er generation preferred the Enrages and Babeuf. In '58, his bicentennary, the French govt. very publicly refused to commemorate him.

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Interestingly I think the bit you mentioned about David's studio was also what stood out most in my mind from the essay. I'm not sure what this indicates. I do see what you mean, though. Perhaps the essay could have been stronger if he'd been a little less broad with his subject. I don't know - it seems he could have made a good point without trying to explain 'everyone' in France and Poland.
Yes... I can't help thinking Darnton's version seems off. If Robespierre wasn't actively being scorned, it still seems unlikely that people would be taking serious offence on his behalf over something like Danton - or that they'd be open about it, anyway...?

By the way, do you mind if I add you? It seems like you've had something awfully interesting to say every time I've come across you.

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Yes, please add me! I'm still fairly new to the technical whatnots of broadband internet, but I will try and post up more Lj stuff as I learn - it's so much better than Facebook!

Darnton's essay still goes much deeper than other things I've read in English on Wajda's film, which tended to be 'it's an allegory of the Solidarity movement', and left it at that, which left me thinking - if Danton's Lech Walesa, how come he's eating stuffed fish while the people queue for bread? - and Darnton does raise that point, too. The other essays on the film online are on 'Jstor', which I can't access, damnit! It's interesting reading the viewer comments on youtube, though, where there's the clip of Robespierre's speech, and imdb, because they're very mixed - some going yay George W, smash the left (err? what?) and some Go Robespierre!, and, well, all shades of opinion about it, really - it's the sign of a interesting piece of cinema, that so many people can take so many different things from it. They should use it in politics classes, though, not history, if they are showing it in schools (though I wish we'd had Franco-Polish cinema shown in our school! We did once have Derek Jarman's version of The Tempest - the teacher switched it off quickly when a bloke emerged from the sea naked! She hadn't realised - Derek Jarman, famously gay film director...

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Well, so long as you don't mind a lot of silly girlish babbling (...no, I don't babble much, because I never post). Ah, and there are technical whatnots on the internet?!

I have not ventured into said youtube comments... hm. But it would be terrible if everybody reacted the same way, I suppose. Also I think it's something you can look at a little differently each time you see it. Well, in the end I'm glad we watched it in school - because I guess I wouldn't be here otherwise! - my teacher was a bit eccentric, and I must say I think he's very cool for showing Danton. However - I don't think he himself had considered it in so much depth, he certainly didn't mention any of that to us (although I do recall him going on about the Polish actors..) - I do think it would have been even cooler shown in some other context. Like a politics class? Too bad we had no such thing at my school, except for what passed for a course on American democracy. I don't know where Wajda would have fit in between this-is-what-pork-barrelling-is-so-never-ever-skip-jury-duty-exam-friday.

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I'm afraid I don't have any original sources for you, but I just wanted to say "Ooo, this turned into an interesting thread." Welcome to the community!

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missweirdness.livejournal.com

me either..lmao

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The book I have that goes into the trial in the most detail is Jules Claretie's book on the Desmoulins (which I have in an 1876 (?) translation) - he transcribed documents since lost in the Hotel de Ville fire. In it, he includes the detail that Robespierre's name is written twice, and crossed out twice, in the list of witnesses to be called. I was wondering if you had come across any more info on this? I don't think Claretie knows if this is a defence or prosecution witness call - it'd be interesting to know if Danton or Desmoulins were still hoping for some assistance from that direction, or a chance to attack him in court!

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Most sources that I've seen suggest that Robespierre was called by the defense, but I don't know their motives. My guess is that it is a bit of both--Danton was quite oppertunistic in his defense and a good off the cuff speaker so he probably would have gone either way depending on whether Robespierre was inclined to help them or further defame them.

I will have to get a copy of htat book.

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