Historicizing the French Revolution - by Antonino de Francesco (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

This book provides a critical examination of over 300 historical works about the French Revolution, published in Europe (in particular in France, Great Britain, Germany, Italy and Russia) as well as in the United States between 1789 and 1989. It also goes on to examine recent trends in French Revolution historiography and consider where histories of this landmark event may go in the future.

By emphasizing the elements which have been valued or hidden, exalted or silenced, Historicizing the French Revolution shows how reflections on 1789 are always fundamentally tied to the times in which they are formulated. Antonino De Francesco looks at the ways in which these historical accounts can be seen to support and, at times, contrast with the formation of political modernity - both in national and international contexts - as it has taken shape in the hundreds of years that have followed this key moment in world history.

Review Quotes

Antonino De Francesco's Historicizing the French Revolutionis far and away the finest and best-informed account we have of the historiography of the French Revolution, and destined for classic status. In addition, by viewing the French Revolutionary tradition in wider European, then global and transnational frameworks, marks a turning point in our understanding of what remains for many a seminal event.
Colin Jones, Author of The Fall of Robespierre (2021)

This is an enormously lucid, learned and instructive work that brims with insight into the many different ways the French Revolution has been interpreted over time. It will prove enormously useful to students and professional historians alike
David A. Bell, Sidney and Ruth Lapidus Professor in the Era of North Atlantic Revolutions; Professor of History, Princeton University, USA

About the Author

Antonino De Francesco is Dean of the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Milan, Italy. He is the author of The Antiquity of the Italian Nation: The Cultural Origins of a Political Myth in Modern Italy, 1796-1943 (2013), the editor of In Search of Preclassical Antiquity: Rediscovering Ancient Peoples in Mediterranean Europe, 19th and 20th C. (2016) and co-editor of Republics at War, 1776-1840: Revolutions, Conflicts and Geopolitics in Europe and the Atlantic World (2013).