echo-de-la-lumiere:

Some have expressed interest in what sources I use for references to the Royal Maréchausée or Nicolas’ political views or assignat inflation debates or les Amis de la Verité. Much of it is an accumulation of a lifetime of interest, but here are some good sources to get started:

• Maria Linton, Choosing Terror: Virtue, Friendship and Authenticity in the French Revolution (2013)
• How do a bunch of well-meaning dudes end up guillotining people who just look at them funny later?
• Mark Darlow, Staging the French Revolution: Cultural Politics and the Paris Opéra, 1789-1794 (2012)
• Really amazing archival research showing how cultural discourse via performances were key to forming public opinion, even though the state had a super-monopoly on what got to be performed.
• Remember how Lestat talks about how Renaud’s isn’t really legit and the Comédie Française is where all the legit actors perform? It’s because of the government, y’all.
• William Doyle, Aristocracy and its Enemies in the Age of Revolution (2009)
• Traces the beginning of the decline of nobility and the effects of naming a particular group “the aristocracy”.
• He also wrote a very short history called Old Regime France that’s worth a read if you care about 1648-1788 France, back when Lestat’s dad would have been important.
• William Doyle’s actually kind of the ultimate first word in French Revolution survey work. He wrote the Oxford History of the French Revolution and he wastes no time with presenting really accessible detailed information that will give you a good feel for the era.
• Jeremy Jennings, Revolution and the Republic: A History of Political Thought in France since the Eighteenth Century (2011)
• Really huge survey of intellectual history, political theory, sociocultural history, and political economy.
• Charles Walton, Policing Public Opinion in the French Revolution: The Culture of Calumny and the Problem of Free Speech (2009)
• Really impressive analysis of how censorship during the French Revolution really messes up ancien regime and new republic troubles.
• If you don’t have a lot of time, the Very Short Introductions series has great brief reads on aristocracy and the French Revolution.
• Alistair Horne, Seven Ages of Paris
• Super sassy and gossipy exploration of Paris from the very beginning. Great research but lots of in-jokes about Bourbons and Plantagenets and stuff and not enough teasing of the Carolingians but I’ll deal. Not great for a first-time history read, but good if you have some foundational knowledge of French history. Just a fun book.
• Joan DeJean, How Paris Became Paris: The Invention of the Modern City
• I haven’t read this one! But it’s on my reading list.
• Baroness Emma Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel
• A novel! But very good for the feel of an era. Also known as the further adventures of Lestat. Very fast read, guilty pleasure, dashing about France, and it even has mistaken identity comedy!
• Rafael Sabatini, Scaramouche
• Another novel! Basically Nicolas tries to avenge a friend’s murder and fucks up really badly.

Books I haven’t read but mean to:

• R.R. Palmer, The Twelve Who Ruled: The Year of the Terror in the French Revolution
• Yes, that Robert Roswell Palmer, the guy who wrote the Palmer & Colton European history textbook everybody lugs around in high school. He’s a fantastic and engaging writer with just the right amount of information to make you feel like a native in that time period. I can’t wait to read this book.
• I think he wrote a book called Catholics and Unbelievers about the same period.
• Simon Schama, Citizens
• Apparently really comprehensive from pre-Revolution all the way through Thermidor.
• Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution
• He wrote this huge 4-part history of the world and I hear it’s a great way to contextualize what was happening in France. So, probably use this for figuring out what Nicolas felt about Italy and England, and why Lestat sent Renaud’s troupe to good ‘ol Blighty.