Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Thomas Paine
Burke's view was opposed by his contemporary, Englishman Thomas Paine, who went to the American colonies
in 1774 to seek his fortune and became a sympathizer with the revolutionaries and an active participant in the new
post-independence US administration. Paine re-crossed the Atlantic to France in 1781 and eventually ended up as
a Deputy in the French National Convention before returning to the US.
Unlike Burke, Paine was a genuinely radical thinker and political activist. Paine's book The Rights of Man (1791
- sold 200 000 copies) was supportive of the republican and democratic aims of the Revolution. Paine, infuriated
by Burke's book, took the view that revolution was a logical remedy for the evils of inherited government with its
arbitrary nature, its fondness for war and its tolerance of poverty, illiteracy and high levels of unemployment. As
events turned out Paine found himself in opposition to the revolutionaries over the execution of Louis XVI and the
Reign of Terror. He fell foul of Robespierre but was rehabilitated after Robespierre's death. Paine left France in
1802 and died in the US in 1809.
Quote: "All hereditary government is in its nature tyranny.... To inherit a government, is to inherit the people, as if
it were flocks or herds"
Thomas Carlyle
After the collapse of the Revolution and the restoration of the monarchy in 1815, Thomas Carlyle wrote his
three-volume history (1837) which characterized the Revolution as a colourful, bloody, tyrannical interlude. The
style of Carlyle's book became famous and/or notorious for its dramatic, almost fictional form of explanation that
produced phrases which are now standard cliches. As to the Revolution, his view was that the monarchy and the
aristocracy got what it deserved in 1789, in an explosion of mass violence. At the same time, it was Robespierre
who was Carlyle's real villain, for directing the Terror with such bloodthirsty efficiency. Carlyle was however
favourably disposed to Mirabeau (if only he had lived beyond 1791), Danton (a real 'man' - unlike the sea-green
incorruptible Robespierre) and Napoleon (very good at whiffs of grapeshot).
Charles Dickens
Carlyle's view was adopted by Charles Dickens, the famous Victorian author, in his novel A Tale of Two Cities
where the revolutionaries were represented as bloodthirsty ogres. Whilst not a historian, Dickens was an
influential writer, arguably the most socially and politically influential English language writer in the 19th century
and his position on the Revolution with its explicit condemnation of the Terror was still being portrayed without
much conscious reflection in 20th century films.
Baroness Orczy
Again not a historian but a very successful writer whose pre-Great War Scarlet Pimpernel novels (the first of
which was published in 1905) followed the Dickens line of a persecuted aristocracy pursued by sinister
Revolutionary authority. These novels were later made into successful films and a recent successful 1990s TV
series. The Burke/Carlyle/Dickens/Orczy representation remains the accepted popular view of the Revolution in
many western countries. Simon Schama in his 1989 Citizens tends to follow the Carlyle line, portraying the
Revolution as a vivid narrative.
Serious history, as a modern academic discipline, began in the first half of the 19th century and the French
Revolution, an incident within living memory, was an early object of professional historical curiosity.
French Revisionists
The French Marxist historians had rejected the CobbanTaylor view. Not only was it a Cold War issue, it was also
non-theoretical (French intellectuals generally prefer Theory) and the Anglo-Saxon view was seen as an attempt
to deny the rightful place of the French Revolution as the major event in modern history.
However two important French historians then came up with their own revisionist view. Francois Fu ret was the
leader of this position (Interpreting the French Revolution, 1981) and he drew on both French and Anglo-Saxon
research and the writings of early 19th century commentator Alexis de Tocqueville, to develop a view that the
Revolution was indeed progressive because it did lead to Enlightenmentstyle equality and democracy - but
because it had to misuse force to maintain itself, the Revolution failed to produce liberty. Furet, and his colleague
Denis Richet argued, for example, that Napoleon could use democracy to gain tyranny because the disruptions of
the Revolution had removed all the checks and balances in society and government which would keep tyrants at
bay - or would at least slow them down. Unlike those who saw the Reign of Terror as a temporary and unpleasant
diversion - or those who saw it as a painful but necessary interlude - Furet's position was that terror was built-in to
the Revolution from the very beginning because, having destroyed early acceptance of differences of opinion, it
could not accept any opposition. The conclusion, the French Revolution had seriously lost its way and the
Jacobins were the originators of modern totalitarianism.
Furet was regarded a maverick by many of his Marxist colleagues whom he had attacked for their allegedly blind
loyalty to the progressivist nature of the revolution which was, in effect, from their point of view a vindication of
radical socialism. In 1978 he controversially declared that the Revolution was dead. He meant that the linking of
the French Revolution to post-Russian Revolution ideology was over and it could now be studied more
dispassionately. Not everybody agreed with him but he kept on arguing until his death in 1997.
Post-revisionism - discourse analysis
In the 1980s as cultural studies grew in strength in the universities especially in the US, a new interpretation arose
based not so much on archival evidence as a postHabermas examination of the language of the documents of the
Revolution. The argument here is that the old regime had lost public support because of the way public opinion
had been influenced by published writings (pamphlets, books etc) prior to 1789. The post-revisionists saw the prerevolutionary period as important because the discourse of that time showed that the monarchy was already on its
way out. This view is part of the postmodern movement which prefers to assess events and evidence as "texts"
instead of accepting evidence as a concrete 'objective' reality.
Narrative History - back in fashion again
One of the most influential books of the past twenty years is Simon Schama's (1789) Citizens. This is partly
because Schama's work represents a return to centre stage of narrative history after so many years of
theoretically-based history, and partly because of his interpretation, which is not to everybody's taste. But then
historians have a tendency to professional jealousy especially when they see a highly talented and very energetic
colleague becoming rich and famous.
Schama all but ignores the more stolid historiography and goes for the passion, the colour and the drama but there
is a point of view beneath all the prose. For Schama the French Revolution was a bloody interlude and, as with
Furet, he feels that the revolution lost its way with the Terror. Interestingly, he is one of the few mainstream male
historians who attempts to deal with gender issues in his book. Citizens is probably too long to be read as a single
narrative by students but does contain many brilliantly written vignettes which are useful and memorable
milestones. For example his account of the Fall of the Bastille - and his movingly written account of the execution
of Louis XVI are excellent classroom texts. Tellingly, the book ends in 1794, after the Terror, and before things
get really complicated!