Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution [Paperback]

For better or for worst the French Revolution set the tone for much of what would follow in Europe. At its worst the Terror was a glimpse into the horrors of the Nazi's and Stalin's great purges. At its best the ideals of the revolution set the tone for free elections, representative government and constitutional law. For revisionist historians it's the former that is the great legacy while for those of the old school it is the latter that is the primary message.

Schama's "Citizens" is above all a great narrative history well documented and thought out. Like most who lean toward the revisionist side he is somewhat sympathetic to the regime and the nobility. That information should certainly aid the reader while navigating this well written work.

You can't help but admire the combination of writing and research that marks this great book. One note, Schama's area of expertise was not originally the French Revolution but rather the Dutch trading empire and it's aftermath. The strengths of Citizens is non stop chronicle of the actions and interactions of the key members of the revolution's story, from Louis the XVI's incompetence to Robspierre's chilling demeaner.

This is an almost epic narrative of the age. It unfortunately, but because of its size, understandably ends far too soon for a complete grasp of the whole era and its aftermath. Definately recommended for students and casual readers of history.

So what's wrong with the book? 1) Well, anecdote can be misleading. At one point in order to emphasize the Convention's proto-totalitarian nature he points to their discussion of a deputy's plans to take children away from their parents so that they could be educated by the state. But Isser Woloch and Jean-Pierre Gross have shown that this particular discussion was more an act of respect to the deputy, who had recently been assassinated, than a serious proposal. Their actual plans for public education were far more moderate and liberal. And while readers may agree with Schama that it is of great symbolic importance that the great painter Delacroix was fathered by Talleyrand, Delacroix's most recent biographer, Barthelmy Jobert strongly argues that it didn't happen. 2) Schama's emphasis on culture and ideology as the winds that smashed the revolution against the rocks are full of problems. American revolutionaries also cited classical antiquity with apparently no ill effects. The two most famous sayings of the American Revolution, "Give me liberty or give me death," "I regret that I only have one life to give to my country," both come from Addison's Cato. Can it really be said that everyone lost their heads over Rousseau, when his admirers, like the Masons and the quasi-Protestant Jansenists, split both ways when the revolution came? 3) It is one thing to quote recent scholarship. But other recent scholarship strongly points out the problems with Schama's account. Gwynne Lewis has pointed out that the nobility cannot really be said to be as capitalist and entrepreneurial as Schama believes. Timothy Tackett has pointed out that the revolutionary deputies were not so besotted with abstract ideology as revisionists believe, while the nobility's deputies were richer, of older lineage, and more Catholic and less liberal than Schama would lead us to believe. Alan Spitzer has pointed out that the evidence of a fundamental fiscal crisis cannot be so easily disposed with. He also points out that one reason why foreign trade collapsed so heavily in the 1790s was because so much of it depended on slavery, which the Convention abolished. Barry Shapiro has pointed out that counter-revolutionary plots were not a paranoid delusion, and that the revolutionary government in its first years had a moderate and responsible attitude towards them. Paul Spagnoli has pointed out that the revolutionary decades saw a clear increase in life expectancy which was not matched in the rest of Europe. Allan Kulikoff has pointed out that the American republic took decades to recover from its own brutal war of American independence. 4) Schama's basic position is elitist and shallow. He equates progress with unregulated markets, views popular movements for democracy with contempt and suspicion and enthuses over a forward looking bureaucracy/elite which could have solved France's problems if political discussion had not gotten in the way. One should point out that Spain, Italy, Germany and Japan have tried this path to the modern state, and they ended up with fascism. Russia tried this path and the State collapsed so badly that only Lenin's Bolsheviks could pick up the pieces. If we are to praise this neo-Burkean vision of the Revolution, we should remember that shortly after Burke's own death 50,000 Irish would be slaughtered by the forces of Order, leaving a legacy of rancid sectarianism for future centuries.