That Magical Word Liberty

A Printer's Life in Enlightenment and Revolutionary Paris
Erscheinungsjahr 2026
ISBN: 978-0-19-784640-7
Verlag: Oxford University Press

Buch, Englisch, 264 Seiten, Print PDF, Format (B × H): 150 mm x 212 mm, Gewicht: 426 g

Nicolas Ruault was a printer and publisher who lived and worked in Paris at the end of the eighteenth century. He is virtually unknown among historians and was intensely aware of, in his own words, his 'obscurity' and 'mediocrity'.

This is far from the truth. Living through the age of the Enlightenment and the tumultuous period of the French Revolution, he rubbed shoulders with some of the leading figures of his age, including the Marquis de Condorcet, Caron de Beaumarchais, Benjamin Franklin, Louis-Sebastien Mercier, Maximilien Robespierre, and Georges Danton. Through 400 remarkable and lively letters from and to Nicolas and in correspondence with six family members and friends, including Condorcet, his life offers fresh insight into Paris before, during, and after the Revolution: his intellectual passions, especially for the works of the philosophes of the Enlightenment; his daily and nightly cultural activities; his eventual commitment to the radical politics of the Revolution; and even his love life.

In so doing, the book reveals the complexity of the age as it was experienced by individuals. We discover Ruault's passionate commitments, his indecision, his vacillation, his 'non-linear evolution' as he confronted and often wavered before the extraordinary events of a revolution that he never anticipated, and as he - and contemporaries the world over - wrestled with the meaning of 'that magical word liberty'.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Tackett, Timothy

Inhaltsverzeichnis

- Introduction

- 1: A Family Affair

- 2: A Bookseller in Paris

- 3: The Colors of Philosophy

- 4: Editing the Works of Voltaire

- 5: Nicolas Ruault's Pre-Revolution

- 6: A New Man

- 7: Revolutionary Printer and Jacobin

- 8: The Summer of '92

- 9: In the Shadow of Death: Tragedies Public and Private

- 10: Thermidor and Beyond

- Conclusion: The Itinerary of a Revolutionary

Über Autor(innen)

Timothy Tackett is one of the world's leading historians of the French Revolution. He taught at Marquette University and the Catholic University of America, before moving to the University of California, Irvine in 1988, and retiring as 'Professor Above Scale' in 2010. The recipient of several fellowships including the Fullbright Fellowship, ACLS Fellowship, and Guggenheim Fellowship, he has written several award-winning books and articles, including Becoming a Revolutionary (1996), When the King Took Flight (2003), The Coming of the Terror (2015), and The Glory and the Sorrow (the last with Oxford University Press, 2021).