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Notes on video lecture:
What were People of 18th Century France Reading?
Notes taken by Edward Tanguay on August 22, 2014 (go to class or lectures)
Choose from these words to fill the blanks below:
Neuchâtel, army, Fear, ribald, sexual, secular, women, price, God, kills, social, Suppers, wrong, Mornet, pirate, nun, permission, money, manners, noble, circulating, Émile, really, love, hunting, Julie, strong, pornography, best, 1781, group, Rousseau
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what were people in 18th century France reading?
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Encyclopédie
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this work had a            that only a thin section of society could hope to afford
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Rousseau
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his most radical and revolutionary works were not comparatively popular
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                        , ou De l’éducation
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Du contrat              ou Principes du droit politique
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Daniel              in the 1900s reviewed 500 libraries of people from 18th century, found one copy of The Social Contract
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most popular works
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          , ou la nouvelle Héloïse
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romantic novel of sensibilities, a novel of               
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we have no          seller lists from there 18th century
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two kinds of books:
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received full public                      from regime
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received only tacit permission
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included the more radical works
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1980s Robert Darnton research on "bad books"
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found that there was a              industry of producing inexpensive copies of revolutionary works outside of France and getting them into the borders
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in Britain and                               , Switzerland
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looking at illegal books tells you want people              wanted to read
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25,000 pirate editions of the Encyclopedie existed
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not only cheap pirate editions shipped into France, but another genre of books
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low-quality books with political and                        themes
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"Venus in the cloister, or the        in the nightshirt"
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the Falsity of Miracles
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Social Contract (Rousseau)
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one can conclude that people wanted to get their hands on obscenity,              literature, and banned Enlightenment works
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the authorities tended to            these together and called them "bad books"
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what was particularly explosive was that the obscene soft porn literature was targeting the            class, the clergy, and indeed, the king himself
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Louis XVI married Marie-Antoinette
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he was 15, she was 14
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under French Royal law, there can only be a king of France, not a Queen
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it takes them 8 years to produce a child and it's a girl
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finally in          a son is born
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he died in 1789
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mockery of the king's              incapacity became politically explosive
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not just the alleged impotency of the king but it suggests that the regime itself is in trouble
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Marie Antoinette becomes a target of this mockery as well
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these underground authors suggest in their writings that she is such a              woman that she has effectively emasculated the king
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this seems to symbolize what has gone            with the regime in general
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since the king was there by the grace of       , this mockery was also religiously explosive
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Louis is also mocked that he rather goes                than run his realm
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he keeps a diary of the birds and animals that his hunting party           , averaging 20-30 per day
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on lists that were found of what bookstores ordered from foreign book producers, there were:
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The Little                at the Hôtel de Bouillon
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"little suppers" were euphemisms for sexual orgies
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Louis XV's private life
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Louis XV's orgies
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the devil in the baptismal font
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                's latest book
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Marie-Antoinette's hobbies
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the allegation that comes through this literature is that the aristocracy can no longer fight, conduct foreign policy, nor make         
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Chevalier d'Eon
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commonly seen dressed as a woman
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rumors that he cross-dressed
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fought in the         
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was a perfect occasion for these writers to mock the aristocracy and monarchy
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Enlightenment writers such as Diderot would dabble in this type of ribald literature when they needed the           
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Paris
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literature is widely distributed
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a literate city
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the vast majority of people could read and write
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           are less literate
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information was commonly passed via market places
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countryside
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85% of France lived in small, rural communities
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50% of men, 25% of women could sign their marriage acts
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colporteurs went from village to village selling printed literature for people to read aloud at family gatherings
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"Bibliotheque bleue"
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medieval horror stories
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witches, superstitions, spells
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anything but Enlightenment literature
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Almanach
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               information
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e.g. how to watch out for pickpockets
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rather than about the lives of the Saints
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had nothing to do with the Enlightenment
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hence one can conclude that the Enlightenment was an urban phenomenon
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but one of the major movements of the French Revolution was The Great         , the fear of the peasant revolt
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this can't be explained in terms of the peasants having Enlightenment ideas such as Rousseau or the Encyclopedie
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the could afford these works
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the illegal books weren't                        to any significant extent through the countryside which were mocking the monarchy and the court
An Introduction to the French Revolution
The Essentials of 18th Century France
18th Century French Clergy and Nobility
The Importance of Regionalism and Locality in 18th Century France
The Contribution of the Philosophes to the French Revolution
What were People of 18th Century France Reading?
The Atlantic Democratic Revolution and the Republic of Letters
1780s France Financial Crisis and its Repercussions
The Third Estate in Revolt
The Peasantry in Revolt
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
The October Days
1789-91: Making the New Nation
Unresolved Issues of the Revolution
The Turning Point in Church Reform