23 âą she/her âą Swedish âą apolitical Interests go to the years 1793â1794 during the French Revolution. Mostly Robespierre and Desmoulins. Trying to back the majority of my posts with a (preferably primary) source.
Discussed that here! I think this is most likely a list of representatives on mission Robespierre (or perhaps the CPS as a whole, since we donât really know if he wrote this just for himself) considers trustworthy.
As for why SJ isnât on it⊠Thatâs actually a very good question.
hi!! iâm having to read schamaâs âcitizensâ for my history coursework (evaluating interpretations as to why the cps fell out) and there are some claims he makes that i donât recognise, and i absolutely do not trust him to get things right, or represent things correctly, so could you please tell me if any of this has any basis or if heâs just making guesses and passing it off as fact đ schama also doesnât cite his sources in the footnotes, thereâs just one massive fuck off bibliography at the end which doesnât help
did carnot ever say this about the supreme being?? and is there anything to suggest that he and prieur were specifically horrified by the lack of immunity?
what about this? i know that barere helped enforce the ventose decrees to appease sj (palmer discusses it), but was this offered to robespierre too, in exchange of stopping the denunciations?? and what about them fearing hanriot and sj staging a coup???
Hyppolite nevertheless follows this up with writing his fatherâs religious beliefs âwere in accordance with the new profession of faith,â citing an intervention made by him at the Convention on May 16 1794 where he is recorded to have stated that âto deny the existence of the Supreme Being is to deny the existence of nature.â
As for any fears Prieur and Carnot might have had concerning the Law of 22 Prairial, I actually had trouble finding the two saying anything about the law at all, both in Hippolyte Carnotâs memoirs and the biographies Le Grand Carnot (1952) by Marcel Reinhard and Prieur de la CĂŽte-d'Or (1946) by Georges Bouchard.
The part about Saint-Just and Hanriot I also view as Schamaâs own interpretation of a fear the other committee members might have had, I donât know of any source where such concerns are voiced. Do they exist, they would have most likely come into existence after Hanriot and Saint-Just were already dead, meaning we should treat them with a grain of salt regardless.
The author has clearly done a fair share of good secondary reading on relevant topics in revolutionary historiography in French and English (Godineau, McPhee, Linton, Leuwers...) and in fact even includes a list of major factual changes or at times inventions at the end of a book (though as we will see later there are a few she missed)
And importantly the author for the most part resists the urge to make the main heroine in a historical novel a girlboss who overcomes all the sexist constraints of society through sheer brilliance. Instead she actually has to struggle with them. So, even as she gets more more interested in politics, she has to constantly work on her readings skills to get from basic literacy to actually reading comfortably (and borrow Maximilian's books) because of the limits of her primary education. When she tries to pain classical or revolutionary scenes in her painting lessons, she actually repeatedly realises or is even told by others (thank you David!) that her paintings are stale â which obviously makes sense when female painting students were to allowed to see real male bodies.
While the book does a lot of good in constantly reminding the reader that Robespierre is not some bloodthirsty dictator but a member of a collective government in the middle of war, it can sometimes come off as if the burden of blame for things that go wrong is shifted to a couple "extremists" - especially Billaud, Collot, Vadier and Amar â rather then having to explain the variances and complexities of revolutionary violence.
Even apart from the final corrections (usually to do with simplifications, cutting out characters etc), there are at least two strange moments with outright incorrect descriptions of political events. Once it is claimed that appart from baning women's clubs the Convention also banned women from its galleries and from gathering in the streets in 1793, even though that only happened after the Insurrection of Prairial in 1795. It is also implied that the Law of 22 Prairial did away with any judicial process entirely, which is simply an overstatement whatever objections one can have to it.
But overall, I would definitely recommend the book - it was in some respects a bit like Piercy's A City of Darkness, a City of Light with occasional modernisation or simplification, but still a well informed and nuanced book, especially in the context of FREV media.
Did you tell the citizens who came to arrest you at citizen Robespierreâs house that if needed, you would spill all your blood in order to have a king?
Yes, I said that.
Do you stand by it?
Yes.
What are the motives which determined and still determine you to desire a tyrant?
I desire a king, because I would prefer that over fifty thousand tyrats, and I only went to Robespierreâs house to see what a tyrant looks like.
When the CPG searched Renault, two small knives were found on her. It was also discovered that, before going to visit Robespierre, she had left a package to one citizen Payen. The package was opened before Renault, and was shown to contain a full set of women's clothing. The interrogation then continued as follows:
What were your intention in providing yourself with these various items?
Fully expecting to go to the place where I would surely be taken, I would be happy to have linen for my use.
What place are you talking about?
About prison, to from there be sent to the guillotine.
What usage were you planning to make of the two knives that were found on you?
Nothing, I wasnât planning to harm anybody.
Signed: Voulland, Dubarran, Amar, David, MoĂŻse Bayle, Vadier, Ălie Lacoste, Lavicomterie, Jagot, Louis du Bas-Rhin. As for her, she refused to sign.
Do you have any particular liasions or associations?
No.
Who are the people who visit your fatherâs house with the most frequency?
Nobody.
What are your opinions on the Republic and the government?
I want a king, because Iâd prefer the power to be in the hands of a single person rather than of forty or fifty thousand tyrants.
How can you suppose that the power of the people, exercised through itself,  its representatives or its mandataires to be tyrannical?
I donât want to share my opinions.
Were your opinions inspired by anyone?
No, and I have no accountability.
Have your manifested your opinions in front of anyone?
No.
Have you in the revolution experienced any loss or been forced into any sacrifice that has been able to serve as a pretext for your opinions?
No, I want a king, I donât have any other motives.
Do you have the hopes of bringing back a king?
Yes, and it doesnât matter to me which one.
How do you imagiene the royalty could be reestablished?
Through the success of the armed coalition powers.
Do you have any reports or intelligence that put you in a position to base your hopes on the allied powers on something?
No.
Did you intend to contribute to the re-establishment of royalty?
Yes.
How did you intend to contribute?
I would have contributed with financial assistance and by all means that would have been in my power; I would also have contributed, depending on the circumstances, to destroying the government and those who exercise its power.
Have you made any attempt to carry out your plan?
No.
Have you written any anonymous letter against the government, or know anyone who has done so?Â
No.
Have you presented yourself at the house of any representative of the people?
I presented myself yesterday at Robespierreâs house, around nine oâclock in the evening.
What was your plan in going to Robespierreâs house.
To talk to him in person.
What did you want to talk to Robespierre about?
I donât want to give any response or explanation regarding this question.
Do you realize that your answers lead one to believe you had the intention of committing a crime, and that you must explain your intentions?
She does not want to explain further, and adds that she intended to ask him for instructions on the situation and the strengthening of the Republic.
Do you realize that your declarations and obstinacy to not want to explain yourself cannot be reconciled with such a plan, which is why Iâm again asking you to explain yourself?
She persists in not wanting to answer.
Did anyone propose to you the plan of going home to Robespierre and did you tell anyone about it?
No.
Did you go to Robespierreâs house several times during the day?
No.
When you went to Robespierre, did you have with you knives, and of which sort?
I carry the tortoiseshell one regularly, the ivory one showed up in my pocket, I didnât know it was there.
When you went home to Robespierre, did you have the intention of using these knives to kill him?
No, moreover, you can judge as you please.
When you yesterday left your fatherâs house, did you tell anyone?
No.
When you left your house, did you carry with you a package containing clothes, and for what purpose had you brought this package?
I had taken this package containing clothes and linen, because I anticipated that by going to Robespierre I would get arrested.
End of the interrogation.
Renaultâs house was searched the night between the 23 and the 24. Suspect things found included two paintings âbearing the effigy of the tyrant and his wifeâ hidden in a cupboard, âseveral papers bearing the signs of feudalismâ and two national guard rifles belonging to the father and son. Under the bed in Renaultâs room was found a banner on which was a crown surrounded by fleur-de-lis printed in large size. In her fatherâs room was also discovered the following letter to his son:
The father was interrogated on the spot and revealed he had three brothers, two sisters, three sons and one daughter âwho left his house on 4 prairial around six in the evening and who he didnât know the location of.â Soon, both he, his sister and his youngest son were arrested and seals placed on their belongings. Arrest warrants were also issued against the two oldest sons of the family, but with both away in the armies they escaped the fate of their relatives.
The Renaultsâ neighbours were interrogated in order to find out more about them. One femme Papin, who made sure to underline she was not close to CĂšcile, had the following to say regarding her disappearance:
Femme Papinâs fifteen year old daughter also came forward, explaining that, on May 23:
Leaving her work and passing by Renaultâs boutique, fille Renault knocked on the window, invited her in, and gave her the task of handing over 16 sols to citoyenne Julles. Then she chatted with her for about a quarter of an hour after which she went up to her place. Then she came back down and went out, saying she would not come back. Renaultâs brother, not seeing his sister return, was worried to the point that he fell ill.
What does your father give you in order to provide for your maintenance?
My dad provides for me, but he only gives me 15 sols per week for personal expenses.Â
Is it your father or you yourself who buys your clothes? Does he give you a lot and does it vary between different seasons?
He gives me that which satisfies me, and he was the one who bought them.Â
Do you consider that, holding the trust of your father and being the one who keeps the house running, it seems surprising that it was your father who bought your clothes; and that in general, these kinds of purchases are a thing of the past for women?
She persists in her former response.
Did you, a little while ago, buy different outfits, and do you in this moment have different clothes at the seamstresses?
Do you understand that one cannot be convinced that, receiving only fifteen sols per week from your father, and this according to your own admission, he would provide you with such a big and beautiful wardrobe?
Can you explain how, having only 15 sols per week to provide for your particular expenses, you intended to pay the six ells of muslin which you just declared to have purchased on credit, without your father's knowledge. Isnât it obvious that you could not pay the price of this muslin without some other special resources?
The confidence the merchant, or better yet his wife, had in me, determined them to make this supply on credit and have me pay it off when I could, in ten or twenty years. I intended to ask my dad for fifty livres when I found the opportunity and give it to them.
Do you remember that in the interrogation held yesterday you declared that you would provide money to those who would help you in your counter-revolutionary projects to re-establish the monarchy in France?
I remember saying that.
How can you reconcile this offer of relief with the shortage in which you declare yourself to be?
I acknowledge the shortage in which I find myself, but I would have sold my belongings to provide for the expenses of the armies allied against the Republic.
How long has it been since you went to confession?
I have no accountability for this. Moreover, churches and priests were suppressed a long time ago.
Who was your confessor when the priests exercised their functions?
I have never been to confession.
Have you been to the house of any priest after they stopped holding office, and has any priest frequented your fatherâs house?
No.
Have you, since the supression, been at the house of the priest of la Magdeleine?
No, because I knew he was a firm patriot, and that he didnât share my opinions.
Iâve seen him five to six times only, but I have never spoken to him. Iâve seen him at my fatherâs house, which is next to that of citoyenne Joyanval.
Were you not surprised one wouldnât give you Robespierreâs adress, and did you tell them you were going to see a man who today was a lot and tomorrow would be no more?
I might have, I donât remember. But speaking to the fireman, I told him: âRobespierre is somewhere.â The fireman having answered that he was president of the Committee of Public Safety, I replied âSo a king then?â
Have you considered that the various admissions made by you in the previous interrogations, together with those recorded in this one, announce that your visit to Robespierre had any other aim than that of discussing only government affairs?
She persists in her previous responses in this regard.
Are you on the point of marrying?
No.
When did you become a royalist?
I have always been one.
I ask you again what it was that determined you to go home to Robespierre was and what your plan was.
She persists in her previous responses, and adds that she would not say more about this; that moreover, it is up to us to guess the rest. (6 prairial, 6 oâclock in the morning)
Soon, Renault did however start having a guilty conscience over having denied her faith, and seven oâclock in the evening the very same day she gave the names of the two late priests that had been in charge of her communion to a judge of the tribunal. When asked if she since then had performed any religious act and who the persons who had made her do that were, Renault simply responded that that was a secret and she had nothing more to say.
During the trial of public prosecutor Fouquier-Tinville one year later, the registrar Wolff claimed that Renault was stripped of her own clothes, covered in rags and threatened during her interrogation:
To force her to make the confession that they wanted to extract from her, she was applied to a type of questioning so ridiculous that it should have made the justice system blush. As the taste of this young girl, who was quite pretty, was to be well dressed, she was stripped of her clothes and covered with dirty and disgusting rags, and in this state she was taken up to the council chamber where she underwent a new interrogation and where the same demands and the same threats were made against her; to which she replied the same way she had already done, adding jeers and mockery against the judges who had the pettiness to use such a ridiculous type of question against her. She was threatened with taking her father and her entire family with her if she did not confess to this alleged assassination.
As Renault was being interrogated, the city section where her family lived also carried out an investigation against them, and through it, even more compromising details came floating up to the surface. It was reported that the family, after the overthrow of the monarchy, had had the words âthe nation, the law and the kingâ on a cartridge box (giberne), words which they at first refused to delete, though they would eventually do so with the âkingâ part. Renaultâs father, speaking of the murder of Lepeletier in January 1793, was said to have had stated âWell! One also wants the death of the king, that will cost them dearly,â while his son had openly lamanted the kingâs and queenâs imprisonment in the Temple while serving as guard there. His statement had been reported to the rest of the guard unit, but he had ignored it, simply saying that he thought what he thought.
Renaultâs three arrested family members â father, brother and aunt â were all interrogated on May 28:
Antoine Renault, 62 years old.
Do you know who the people are that your children frequent and have relations with?
I only know of indifferent relations to neighbors or relatives. A sister of mine, a former nun, called sister gray, came to my house and conferred with my daughter, without me remarking anything in particular between them. Said sister is very attached to religion.
Learning that we were writing down this part of his response, he wanted to cut it out.
Does your daughter have any fanatical prejudices and any passions typical for her age?
I havenât noticed in my daughter any religious affections, she appears rather indifferent when it comes to this subject. There exists no clue she has any passions, on the contrary, she is watched over and never leaves the house alone, except for when she rarely goes to the market. When she goes out, I always accompany her. I add here that my daughter is very attached to her aunt.
How do you provide maintenance for your daughter?
I myself buy what is necessary for her.
Where were you the fourth (23rd) this month?
I stopped working (jâai descendu la garde) at two aâclock, I had dinner at my place with my son and daughter. Five oâclock, being on the point of going to bed, my son and daughter engaged me to go out to relax. I did so, carrying with me 25 livres that he owed to a laundress. I returned home at eight o'clock in the evening, where I found my son and the fille Pepin (Papin), both in anguish, and the former troubled because my daughter, who had been gone since six oâclock, had not returned. They told me that before leaving, she had told them to wait for her, that she would return, without saying where she was going. I had as my plan to go see if my daughter was at her auntâs house, so I left my house, but fearing to meet her on the way, I went inside and went to bed, as did my son, and we got arrested in the night. I donât know what has become of my daughter since this moment.
He is asked about the small pieces of furniture (petits meubles) that his daughter owned.
I know of scissors, a bad knife with an ivory handle, which was given to her by her brother; another knife with a scale handle, from my dead sister. She does not usually carry them and often has neither.
Do you know what your daughterâs opinion is on the revolution?
She is a good patriot, she loves the republic very much.
Does your daughter miss the tyrant and has she shown that she desires to see a king reestablished in France?
No.
Have you yourself, in your house, sought to inspire your children with dispositions contrary to the Republic and the current government?
No.Â
One shows him the letter dated January 3 1793 written by him to his son, the two portraits of the king and the queen found, the two small knives, scissors and a case that he recognizes as belonging to his daughter.
He responds to questions asked regarding the denounciations of which he has been the object. He has never heard his daughter talk about Robespierre or her plan.
Does your daughter know how to read and write?
No, moreover, my daughter has so little inclination towards fanaticism that she has never taken what is called first communion, and has never approached a priest to make what is called confession.
The same day, Antoine-Jacques Renault, 31 years old.
Did you know that the paintings were being kept in a cupboard?
Yes.
Have you served as guard at the Temple?Â
Yes, two times.
He denies the conversation attributed to him by a denouncer. He is asked again if priests came to his house and if they declaimed against the Republic?
No.
Do you know Admirat?Â
No.
When your sister went out, why were you so worried?
As my sister usually doesnât go out, I was worried over not seeing her again.
Do you observe that the situation in which you find yourself does not indicate simple concern, but deep affection to dreadful events?
He persists in his answer.
Do you know that your sister planned to assassinate members of the Committee of Public Safety, and were you involved in the plot?
No.
The same day Edme-Jeanne Renault, 60 years, former nun, rue de Babylone, 698.Â
Do you often go home to your brother, Antoine Renault?
Have you had any particular conversations with fille Renault?
I view her as my niece, without particularities.
Do you know someone named Admirat, and do you know that he was known to your niece?
No.
Did you know about your nieceâs plan? Were you an accomplice? Do you know who inspired it? Did conversations hostile to the republic take place in your house?
No.
The same day her three relatives were heard, Renault was her too picked in by Dumas for a fourth interrogation:
Eight days before your arrest, did you not strongly press a seamstress to carry out work that you had given her?
Yes, and these works were garments.
Did you say to this worker that you were in a hurry for these clothes, and that you didn't know what could happen, and that you could get guillotined in eight days?
I may have said that.
How is it that eight days before your arrest, you could foresee that you could get guillotined?
I have no idea.
Did your family know that you were preparing for first communions?
Never.
How did you know that Blondeau, priest of Saint-Denis-du-Pas, died last Pentecost?
It is only too true that the good priest is dead, I do not want to say from whom I learned of his death.
Do you want to declare that it was he who suggest to you the plan that you attempted to carry out?
Nobody did.
Do you often see your aunt, the former nun?
About every fortnight, and not as often as I would have desired.
The trial started on June 17 and lasted only for a few hours (Iâve unfortunately not discovered the minutes for it). All of the 54 accused, with the exception of Admirat, denied having been involved in any assassination plan. That was however not enough to stop the tribunal from sentencing every single one of them to death. They were executed at four oâclock the very same day, all dressed in red shirts, which the penal code of 1791 had proclaimed all condemned murderers were to wear.
Though Robespierre never so much as saw Renault or Henri Admirat, the assassination attempts are still often seen as a contributing factor to a decline of his mental health in the last months of his life. Already on May 25, he was the author of the following CPS decree, rather panicky in tone, asking Saint-Just, who was currently away with the armies, to return to Paris:
The assassination attemps are also commonly seen as a contributing factor to the creation of to the Law of 22 Prairial, passed by the Convention on June 10, which Renault and the other accused were also judged under.
-> Here Iâd like to point out that Brissot had earlier tried to dissuade his wife from putting her own names on her work and once said "'Does the public need to have your name? You know that I donât like lady writers... Besides, a translation is nothing much'" (Bour p.884-885) So it's possible that regardless of who did the work, he either did not think it appropriate for her to be publicly recognized or he didnât see it as significant.
-> Bour concludes: âfor [A History of England] and others that followed, it is impossible to attribute the translation to Brissot or to his wife singly with any certainty: they most probably tended to collaborateâ (p. 881)
âBoth Brissots would have been aware of Wollstonecraftâs Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790); though this book was not translated, it made its author famous in France as well as in Britain. So, another work whose title echoed the first would also have caught their attention. Further, we know from a letter of Brissot to his friend Jean-Marie Roland de la PlatiĂšre that important books published in England were sent to him: â (p. 883)
âIn 1792, though she was still very fond of her husband, she deplored that she saw so little of him and that they had not kept up the intellectual closeness that existed during their engagement and early on in their married life.â (p. 883)
Boer does acknowledges the speculative nature of her analysis and recognizes that there are others, all from the Girondin circle, who could've done the translation, namely:
Sophie de Grouchy, Condorcetâs wife, who translated Adam Smithâs Theory of Moral Sentiments in 1798
Boer sees in some notes echoes Brissotâs anticlericalism, criticism of Anglicanism, and support of Quakers, and other ideas and experience that crop up in his background:
âOther notes seem to bear his stamp, like one that defends some British academics, whom Wollstonecraft denigrates unsparingly, characterising them as âthe pedantic tyrants who reside in collegesâ... Brissot mentions the Scottish historian William Robertson and another Scot, Hugh Blair, professor of rhetoric and belles lettres, as being worthy of esteem. (Robertson is also mentioned in a note in the Preface to the Lettres philosophiques et politiques, xv)â (p. 889)
There is also âa note about a girlsâ school in âQueenâs Squareâ (now Queen Square) in Bloomsbury, very near the street where the Brissots lived, at 26 Newman Street..." (p. 889)
"In [the same] note the annotator identifies himself as a man: âMontaigne who on occasions is quite unsparing with the sex on the whole thinks that it is roughly worth as much as our ownâ... This contrasts with the note at the beginning of Chapter VI in which the annotator unambiguously identifies herself as a woman.â (p. 889)
âThe annotator, in Chapter XII, knows Miltonâs works wellâBrissot had been consulted about translating Paradise Lost as part of a commercial venture. The plan did not come to fruition, though he did translate two Books (Memoirs I, 208). Towards the very end of the Vindication, where Wollstonecraft writes âWhat are the cold, or feverish caresses of appetite, but sin embracing death...â the French annotator remarks: âThis is a conceit of Miltonâsââ (p. 889)
âBrissotâs conservatism when it comes to womenâs place in society is palpable here and there, as in this note: ⊠âThere is a great deal of truth in what the author says about the need to strengthen the body and the soul of women. Condemned by nature to give birth in pain, and to be subject to all the illnesses to which the noble and touching charge of maternity exposes them, they should early on strengthen their constitution; but let them not move too far away from nature. Much of their charm and their sway is due to their weakness; a Woman must be a Woman in all possible ways.â This opinion, which is poles apart from the first note in Chapter VI, seems to confirm that the note is Brissotâs: his intellectual mentor was Jean-Jacques Rousseau, whose Profession de foi du vicaire Savoyard radically altered the nature of his religious faith; as he says in his Memoirs (I, 38), âit was the first book which caused the scales to fall from his eyesâ. He visited Switzerland in 1782 partly to see where the philosopher hailed from. The end of the note is a kind of paraphrase of the end of Chapter V of Emile, where Rousseau says that a woman wins sway through gentleness (lâempire de la femme est un empire de douceur)." (p. 889)
âThe wife who readily understands the non-entity she has become for her husband often smothers her misery in silence, for the sake of her darling family.â (Bour p. 884)
Although I find the linguistic analysis fascinating, and possibly convincing, I feel like I have to point out the fact that despite its technical usage and relative rarity, it must've been in wider circulation than the written sources imply. Nullity is also not a common English word, and it's one I first saw in Baudot's description of Augustin Robespierre. From the biography by Mary Young, p. 165-166:
â 'He was,' says Baudot, regarded as âsuch a nullity that he could have stayed unnoticed on 9 Thermidor."
The biography cites Baudot, A., Notes Historiques sur la Convention Nationale, le Directoire, lâEmpire et lâExil des Votants, published in 1893, so I don't know when Baudot would've actually written those words, but Wikipedia says he died in 1837; who knows when this word would've entered his vocabulary.
Letter: â 'I think no marriage should take place without a preliminary course of education taken in a family. Both men and women should undergo this trial. I could go on and on if I told you about all that I think is to be done to the married state. The main thing is to tell young women that they must be completely selfless and have no desires other than their husbandâs, while being clever enough to have him believe that he gives more than he demands.' â (Bour, p. 887)
Note in Vindication, Chapter VI: â âThe position of women in society is singular indeed, though they are burdened with tasks as onerous as men, or perhaps more so! When single, it would be in vain for them to acquire speculative or practical knowledge greater than that of the most promising young men, for men in their inconsistent nature and exclusive pride forbid them to show it, deny them the use of it; as wives, their non-entity is more complete, if possible; indeed, though learned and brave, the wife of a fool and a coward will never enjoy any consideration, for the consideration given her is bound up with that shown to him, who deserves none; as a mother and a widow, she is still confined within the narrow bounds of domestic duties; if she is rich, she will at best be privileged to do without a steward and to be her own first housekeeper! Why equip ourselves to do great things when we are doomed to do small ones only!â â
Repeated, specific references to people & places the Brissots were familiar with (the girls' school in Queen's square, Richard Price, Joseph Priestly, William Robertson [whom the annotator defends, despite Wolstoncraft's criticism, and whom Brissot had mentioned in another translation])
[if you need a copy of the article below, let me know and you can borrow my pdf đ]
Article: Isabelle Bour (2022) Who translated into French and annotated Mary Wollstonecraftâs Vindication of the Rights of Woman ?, History of European Ideas, 48:7, 879-891, DOI: 10.1080/01916599.2021.2022081
Why is everybody calling Camille by his first name and not his surname? Not only his friends/close cycle but everyone, even to us everybody else is knows as Robespierre, Saint-Just, Danton but he is simply Camille.
Hi!
So I'm not sure either to be honest (â @â _â @â )
I've seen people call different revolutionaries by both their first and last name,it depends from person to person but I see where you're coming from!
It may be because Camille is easier to pronounce the Desmoulins,or because it simply sounds better?
Or it may be simply something we all agreed on as a community?
I've encountered an earlier post where you've said "It is Robespierre himself who talks about this episode in an undelivered speech (speaking of himself in third person like he sometimes does for some reason)" and it made me giggle for an hour because Robespierre talking about himself in the third person is so strange and also somehow unsurprising to me.
Are there any more examples of him talking about himself in the third person like this and could you give quotes or approximations of it from the sources.
Unfortunately I am monolingual so I won't be able to understand the French text⊠yet, so I apologize in advance for any trouble this effort may cause you.
Thank you so much for your blog by the way. It's taught me so much and I'm always looking to learn more.
Sure, here are the instances of Robespierre referring to himself in third person that I for the moment know of:
On [blank] Chabot went to find one of the members of the Committee of Public Safety and said to him: âI have come to wake you up, but it is to save the nation; I have uncovered the thread of the most dangerous conspiracy ever hatched against liberty.âÂ
Robespierre in an undelivered speech written around March 1794
Robespierre was accused; he (Danton) didnât say a single word if it wasnât for isolating himself from him.
Robespierre in his notes against the dantonists (March 1794)
[Bourdon de l'Oise] presented a clerk to [the Committee of Public Safety] which Carnot placed in his offices and who has been dismissed from it upon the repeated proposal of Robespierre.
Robespierre in a note on Bourdon de lâOise (June-July 1794)
Plot twist: the biggest myth surrounding Maximilien Robespierre isnât that he was an all powerful dictator constantly thirsting for the blood of French infants or whatever, but rather the idea that he was nicknamed âMaximeâ among his friends. đ±
you know Billaudâs childhood memoirs. Iâve never seen anyone talk about them apart from the gooning in church subplot so I wondered what your take on it was. I read it in google translate and he seemed to be going through it
I have only read Tumblr posts about that story of Billaudâs, as I canât find it in full online anywhere (in the post it says the memoirs were published in the book Towards the Brink(1989) that can be found on Internet Archive but isnât borrowable. If anyone knows some other place where they can be read, please share!)
As for my take on the excerpts that I have read, @montagnarde1793 has brought up the fact the real Billaud did not attend the school he in the story portrays the events as taking place at, so that probably rules out it being a full on drawn from life story, even if that of course doesnât remove the idea of it simply having happened at a different school. Regardless, Billaud writing a self-insert story about having sex with other boys probably points to him not being 100% straight if I may put it like thatâŠ
đŹ 1  đ 42  â€ïž 124 · Interesting, but Françoise Brunel, who has done a lot of work on Billaud contends that thereâs no evidence that Billaud
đŹ 0  đ 8  â€ïž 26 · No worries! In any case, I think homoeroticism in historical texts is often one of those âseek and you will findâ kinds of
Aside from the fact De Gouges elevated status leads to other aspects of the revolution getting overshadowed and/or unfairly demonized, many also seem to find her too moderate to be deserving of said status in the first place. People have pointed out flaws in de Gougesâ reasoning when it comes to both of the areas where she today is most celebrated for having taken a stand â womenâs rights and slave emancipation. When it comes to the first subject, people have underlined that her efforts mainly amounted to rewriting the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen from 1789 so that it included both men and women, but in reality did very little to change the situation for actual French women. As for the abolishment of slavery, it has been pointed out that de Gouges was against slaves using violence to free themselves, which many find to be a naive take to say the least.
Now I think it deserves to be said de Gouges is hardly the only revolutionary to hold beliefs that were progressive for her time but still rather problematic for the modern day (for example, Claire Lacombe, a prominent member of the all female Society of Revolutionary and Republican Women, also openly told other women to stay out politics if they had children to take care of, while Robespierre wanted to abolish slavery but also accused the girondins of having âwanted in an instant to free and arm all the Negroes to destroy our colonies.â) But it is of course much easier to point out someoneâs ideas donât reach perfection if the person in question is commonly presented in an idealized manner compared to if theyâre not.
Finally, I think it should be said tumblr tends to skew robespierrist and montagnard, so a woman who outright wrote to Robespierre telling him to drown himself in 1792 and wanted the French people in 1793 to vote on whether they wanted a republican government, a federal government or a monarchic government might not always be received too wellâŠ
Here are two posts discussing de Gouges critically if you want to hear more:
đŹ 5  đ 33  â€ïž 112 · No, Olympe de Gouges Was Not Executed for Being a Feminist
As @mathildeaquisexta and @robespapier already explained so
đŹ 0  đ 3  â€ïž 28 · This might be a bit controversial but Iâm just going to leave it here for discussion. Of all the amazing women from the En
Hello! What information do you have about charges of corruption against Desmoulins?
In The Life and Opinions of Maximilien Robespierre (1974) historian Norman Hampson writes that it was âcommonly thoughtâ Desmoulins and Fabre dâĂglantine lined their own pockets when they served as Dantonâs secretaries during the latterâs time as Minister of Justice. He doesnât cite any source for this allegation however.
Desmoulins also got mentioned in the following way in the act of accusation against the East India Company scandal. He was however never questioned about this charge at his trial:
Camille Desmoulins nonetheless supported the hopes of the financial companies with all his might; he also wanted to share the product of their plunder, and said on this occasion that he couldnât understand how it could be so people didnât earn money in France, because Desmoulins himself, among a host of means that presented themselves to his mind, was bothered only by the amount of choices [for money-making] there was.
In private letters, Desmoulins firmly denies having used the revolution to enrich himself. Make of that how much or how little you want I guess:
And I, who for five years devoted myself to hatred and peril in the name of the Republic, I who kept my poverty through the Revolution.
Desmoulins in his last letter to his wife, 1 April 1794
Teenage Lucile Desmoulins being #relatable compilation
Source: Lucileâs diary from 1788 and 1789
1788Â
Friday 27 â I want to finish my story, I cannot finish it! I pick up the pen, I want to write, but nothing comesâŠ
Monday 30 â [âŠ] I had fun breaking dead wood, then I found a snail. I examined it a little, I broke its shell, but having fallen onto my stomach it made me cry out loud, because this ugly beast was crawling on my stomach!
Sunday 5 â [âŠ] After dinner, I went upstairs to read a few passages from Grandisson, but I had to go back down to go for a walk with everyone, which annoyed me quite a bit, because I would have liked to read forever.
Monday 6 â I didnât go out all morning, I did nothing but read.
Monday 21 â [âŠ] Maman made me tremble last night: she came to fetch the inkwell, I was in bed, she opened my drawer to take a pen, I was afraid she would take my diaryâŠ
Thursday 24 â [âŠ]  I love only one person on earth, her alone! Yes, Maman alone makes all my happiness, everything else is indifferent to me. Sheâs the only friend I want to have.
Saturday 26 â [âŠ] I spent the morning, as well as the Friday afternoon, without being able to do anything, starting everything and finishing nothing.
Monday 28 â [âŠ] I went and threw myself on a haystack, I stayed there a long time. I found a few hours of happiness there. [âŠ] This lack of spirit does not leave me. I dare not talk about it because I cannot explain what I feel, not understanding it. They would laugh at me.
1789 (undated entries)
How upset I am! Everything I see only serves to despair me! Scourge of the earth, you whom heaven made to punish us⊠How tired I am of living, and I fear to die⊠Alas, why am I?⊠What am I useful for on earth? If I didnât exist⊠I donât know what Iâm saying anymore. My mind is absent, I go to bed without thinking about where I am⊠What am I? Very littleâŠ
[âŠ] What, men⊠Oh, what a lot to say! Be quiet, Lucile, let the men do what they want, close your eyes to their actions, you have nothing to do with themâŠ
Cruel moments, which have lasted too long!⊠The dreadful memory still comes to torment me⊠Ah, all my life I will remember it! Oh, what temerity! O you, happy inhabitants of these sweet lands, you guided by simple nature, how I envy your fate! Why was I not born among you? I have rage in my heart⊠Flow my tears, flow, relieve my pain or rather consume me! Perish my memory! May I be reduced to ashes, and may the winds scatter it throughout the earth!
đŹ 1  đ 24  â€ïž 53 · Some info on Simone EÌvrard? :3
Iâm basing the majority of this answer on this great article, so if Iâm not citing a sou
đŹ 2  đ 10  â€ïž 45 · Frev friendships â Simonne Ăvrard and Albertine Marat · [Albertine] had come to Paris after the death of her brother, at