Book description
Nineteenth-century France was one of the world's great cultural
beacons, renowned for its dazzling literature, philosophy, art, poetry
and technology. Yet this was also a tumultuous century of political
anarchy and bloodshed, where each generation of the French
Revolution's 'children' would experience their own wars, revolutions
and terrors.
From soldiers to priests, from peasants to Communards, from
feminists to literary figures such as Victor Hugo and Honor de
Balzac, Robert Gildea's brilliant new history explores every aspect of
these rapidly changing times, and the people who lived through them.
Robert Gildea has spent a lifetime studying modern France. Among his
major works are
France Since 1945
and
The Past in French History
. His last book,
Marianne in Chains
, won the Wolfson Prize for History in 2002. He is Professor of Modern
History at the University of Oxford.
