The Glory and the Sorrow, Timothy Tackett
The Glory and the Sorrow, Timothy Tackett
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The Glory and the Sorrow
A Parisian and His World in the Age of the French Revolution

Author: Timothy Tackett

Narrator: Derek Perkins

Unabridged: 5 hr 52 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 09/13/2022


Synopsis

What was it like to live through one of the most transformational periods in world history? In The Glory and the Sorrow, eminent historian Timothy Tackett answers this question through a masterful recreation of the world of Adrien Colson, a minor lawyer who lived in Paris at the end of the Old Regime and during the first eight years of the French Revolution.

Based on over a thousand letters written by Colson, this book vividly narrates everyday life for an "ordinary citizen" during extraordinary times, as well as the life of a neighborhood on a small street in central Paris. It explores the real, day-to-day experience of a revolution: not only the thrill, the joy, and the enthusiasm, but also the uncertainty, the confusion, the anxiety, and the disappointments. While Colson reported on major events such as the storming of the Bastille and the King's flight to Varennes, his correspondence underscores the extent to which the great majority of Parisians in no way anticipated the Revolution; the incessant circulation and power of rumors of impending disasters in Paris, not just in the summer of 1789 but continually throughout the Revolutionary decade; and how this affected popular psychology and behavior.

An evocative account of Colson's time and place, The Glory and the Sorrow is a compelling microhistory of Revolutionary France.

About Timothy Tackett

Timothy Tackett is professor emeritus of history at the University of California, Irvine. His publications include The Coming of the Terror in the French Revolution; Religion, Revolution, and Regional Culture in Eighteenth-Century France; and Becoming a Revolutionary.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Aleksa

This was fascinating book in which author argues that we need a major rethinking of the factors that gave rise to the Terror, a rethinking which takes into a account the emotions of revolutionaries. That why the author focus into the life of the Parisian lawyer by examining thousands letters he sent......more

Goodreads review by Stephen

Timothy Tackett brings to life the daily comings and goings of Parisians during the frenzied days of the French Revolution in "The Glory and the Sorrow." Tackett usefully teases out how ordinary citizens were swept up in the political tides of the 1790s, and how most men and women in the urban core......more

I enjoy histories that approach a period of history by following a single character. Rather like spending time working in a country rather than just visiting......more