Annotated Bibliography Sample
Annotated Bibliography Sample Andress, David. The French Revolution and the people. London: Hambledon and London, 2004.
The French Revolution in 1789 constituted the fundamental consequence in the modern history. According to Andress, A major nation was vulnerable to political revolution which was followed by social revolution, with war and prevalent Terror as a result of Louis XVI’s execution in 1793. Andress argues that the Revolution started as a result of the opposition of a minority to the absolutist government and it later spread to include the entire nation, with women and men who constituted the class of peasants, as well as the poor, craftsmen, and those individuals living in rural areas. This book of The French Revolution and the People is considered as a portrait of France’s common people, in the urban areas and the rural areas; in Lyon and Paris; and in the Provence, Vendee, and Brittany. Popular reactions and grievances affected the outcome and events of the French Revolution at every stage which in turn led every individual in France to experience the impacts of the Revolution. Andress’ book, The French Revolution and the People is regarded as lifelike story of violence, conflict, and death. Andress argues that there were both losers and winners and not all the misery was in vain, while the Ancien Régime’s injustices were thrown away.
Blanning, T. C. W. The rise and fall of the French Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.
This is the collection of many articles regarding the revolution that the French Revolution’s historiography has experienced in the previous twenty five years. According to Blanning, it is apparent that scholars are making use of developments in some areas as critical theory and anthropology to as a variety of new questions as well as to invent new techniques of understanding the historic period. The articles that make up The Rise and Fall of the French Revolution were originally found in the Journal of Modern History. The contributors of these articles include Suzanne Desan, Keith Michael Baker, Bill Edmonds, Vivian R. Gruder, François Furet, James N. Hood, David Lansky, Lynn Hunt, Paul Hanson, Colin Lucas, Mona Ozouf, John Markoff, Alison Patrick, William H. Sewell, Jeremy D. Popkin, Dale Van Kley, Timothy Tackett, and Theda Skocpol. In addition to these contributions, Blanning employed a significant introduction in the discussion of the evolution of the French Revolution and how the contributors have helped shape the debate. This collection describes the rise and fall of the Revolution, and it as well allows the reader to know different techniques being used by prominent historians in the field. Therefore, the collection on the French Revolution provides an obliging combination of opinion and information, interpretation and narrative.
Carlyle, Thomas. The French Revolution: a history. Modern Library pbk. ed. New York: Modern Library, 2002.
Thomas Carlyle was a renowned historian, satirical writer, teacher, and essayist in the Victorian era. In his work, Carlyle has combined history, sermon, epic, and mock-epic, which enables the reader to view events and men’s persistent change, therefore controlling the way people react to the paradigms. It is apparent that when the characters such as Marie Antoinette and Louis are seen close at hand, one sympathizes with them, while when they are seen from a distance especially from outside their viewpoint, one judges them. Carlyle also places people at the philosophical and moral center of the world so that the plight of the characters he used in his writing are not evaluated by their needs and standards but by what he considers to be eternal. Thomas Carlyle has used a unique style in his book which is overly sensational and dramatic. He paints a ghastly description of the utter and complete pandemonium of the times, specifically the Great Terror in 1794. However, Carlyle does remain fairly non-judgmental about the key figures of the French Revolution, and enables the readers to elucidate for themselves regarding who the real perpetrators are. He has oversimplified the obvious at particular occasions in his book, but the poetic style is fascinating. As Carlyle’s shocking and dismal tale of suffering continues, the readers are drawn into a trance and daze similar to the unfortunate victims during the Great Terror. He provides a good base for his readers to understand the French Revolution history because Carlyle’s book on French Revolution is exciting and informative.
Corzine, Phyllis. The French Revolution. San Diego, CA: Lucent Books, 1995.
Phyllis Corzine is a famous and very competent in writing a non-fiction. The French Revolution by Phyllis Corzine is a prominent non-fiction for libraries and classrooms. It is an interesting book with vivid descriptions which focus on the quotations from the primary source which are clear and therefore enhancing better understanding of the text. She profoundly and amazingly describes the account of hardships that people experienced in France during the time of such financial and partial turmoil. Corzine has used copious and very encouraging text features like table of contents, forward, timeline, credits, index, and further reading to enable the readers understand better on the history of the French Revolution. She has also used text boxes in her work which is the most useful and most relevant feature. The text boxes that are used in the book significantly help the reader to understanding the background information regarding various characters in the entire textbook. She has also used pictures as another important text feature in her work. Pictures help the reader have a visual of various characters and places within the textbook. This text book is well crafted and very helpful for a student who does not have experience on the French Revolution and is studying this topic for the first time.
Doyle, William. The French Revolution: a very short introduction. Oxford: New York: 2001.
William Doyle is a famous English historian who specialized in the 18th century France. He is among the best revisionist historians who are interested in the French Revolution. William Doyle teaches at Bristol University and he is a regent of The Society for the Study of French History. Through his book, William Doyle enable the reader to realize that the effects due to French Revolution like decimalization, and the political orientation of human rights, still exist in today’s world. He briefly surveys the old regime and the factors that led to its collapse. Doyle makes it clear on how the French Revolution occurred which is comprised of the following: the reason to why the revolutionaries quarreled with the church, the king, and Europe as a whole; the reason to why this created Terror; and how it managed to accomplish rule by a general. He elucidates how the French Revolution destroyed the antique cultural, social, institutional structures in France. In his book, Doyle also elucidates how the ancient regime turned ancient and he examines the cases in which accomplishment failed to correspond with ambition. He digs into the legacy of the French Revolution concerning the rationality in public issues and the responsible government. Doyle finishes the examination of the French Revolution by discussing the reasons to why it has been controversial.
Furet, Franc%u0327ois. Interpreting the French Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1981.
Furet views the French Revolution as an historic event that is different from other historic events. He has made it clear that French Revolution has more issues to talk about than just being a subject of intellectual interest because it has been considered to be part of a political and moral heritage. Furet argues that this central historical event has usually been in the same way since it started. He asserts that there have been a number of accounts of the Revolution, and even if they have different opinions, they have frequently been anniversary or commemorative interpretations regarding the original historical event. Therefore, in intellectual terms, the demarcation of the revolutionary historiography is not between the left and the right, but between the conceptual and commemorative history, as represented respectively in the writings of Tocqueville and Michelet.
In his work, Furet provides an analysis on how conceptualization can be done regarding an historic event such as the French Revolution, and keys out the revolutionary changes that the French Revolution created as well as its continuity. Furet thoroughly analyzed the tragic relevancy of the French Revolution by referring to the contemporary experience and discussing a variety of ideas in the work of Augustine Cochin and that of Alexis de Tocqueville, which no other Revolution historian has ever used systematically. This book is based on the completing ideas of Augustine Cochin and Alexis de Tocqueville with an effort cut across the evident and deceptive clarity of some contradictory aspects of the French Revolution, and to enable the reader understand some of the puzzling issues of the revolutionary ideology. According to Furet, this will be very significant to sociologists, students, and historians.
Haddock, Bruce. A history of political thought: 1789 to the present. Cambridge [u.a.: Polity,2005.
In his original and lucid textbook, Bruce Haddock combines historical and theoretical analysis, which sets a political thought about the context of the emergent cultural, economic and cultural framework of the contemporary world. He traces the contrastive criteria put forward to justify specific kinds of political order since 1789 until the present day, regarding the colossal effect of the American and French revolutions, through constitutional and reaction consolidation. In his book, Haddock has written chapters that are formed around central themes such as welfare, liberty, totalitarianism and the national state, focusing on the reaction of theorists to the underlying political and ideological controversies. The major thinkers that are covered in his book include Burke, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Tocqueville, Mill, Schmitt, Lenin, Mazzini, Hayek, Rawls, and Oakeshott. It can also be seen that Haddock confronts thought provoking questions regarding the status of political and moral principles. According to Haddock, moral and cultural controversy is actually the characteristic of man’s day in day out experience. However, he asserts that in the recent decades, the foundations of ethical and political theory have raised questions significantly. Haddock has highlighted the occurrence of a dilemma which is experienced by all citizens. The dilemma in his book is concerned with how human beings should make opinions of value from fixed positions in cultural and social communities.
Hampson, Norman. Enlightenment and revolution: essays in honour of Norman Hampson. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2004.
Norman is among the few historians who have greatly contributed to the study of Europe in the eighteenth-century. He has written numerous articles and many books about the Enlightenment and Revolutionary France and at the same time teaching at the various universities such as the Universities of York, Manchester, and Newcastle. Through Norman’s writing, it is very clear that he has played a significant role in the European society as a founding President for the Study of French History. He has also profoundly influenced a generation of scholars about the French Revolution. Through his writings, it is depicted that the accomplishments of the Enlightenment and Revolution has been put together.
Taking a broad intellectual and cultural approach, the volume is made up of contributions by various students of eighteenth century in Europe, who do research on topics about the French Revolution and enlightenment. These essays cover very diverse disciplines such as army reform and science, interest of French in China, the links between Hume and Voltaire, and Atlantic slavery, and they are linked by approaches and themes that bear the authentication of the influence of Norman Hampson. Enlightenment and the French Revolution, however, is not just an admiration of his work, but the essays in the collection dig into new topics in the history of the revolutionary period and review some of the more conversant facets of Enlightenment and Revolution. Therefore, the essays provide a suitable tribute to the writings and spirit of Norman Hampson.
Hanson, Paul R. The Jacobin Republic under fire: the Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution. University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003.
This book of Hanson is conceived imaginatively and constantly researched because of its well-written nature regarding the study of Federalist revolt and the French Revolution. Hanson has arrived at an interesting point regarding the differing perspectives on sovereignty, and the book has real been found to have merit. It has therefore been recommended to be used in personal and public libraries the interpretive analysis of Hanson, is a careful mixture of thematic and narrative chapters, which will be of more help to non-specialists. In his book, Hanson provides a very important synthesis of the material that is frequently neglected in the narrating of the story regarding the French Revolution. Even the bibliography of primary, secondary, and archival sources should prove helpful to those individuals interested doing research about the French Revolution as a topic. This book also includes the departmental maps which provide important visual aids for the readers to fully understand the political occurrences and situations. Hanson’s book includes skillful weaving of local political anxieties that served as the starting point for revolution and the national political predicament. Among the fundamental questions regarding the French Revolution is what occurred to the nation since the monarchy foundered in 1792 to the Terror of 1794 as the Public Safety Committee ruled by repression and fiat. According to Hanson, a fundamental moment in this period was the Federalist Revolt as provincial cities Bordeaux, Marseille, Lyon, and Caen rebelled against the revolutionaries in Paris which threatened dump France in a civil war.
Hibbert, Christopher. The days of the French Revolution. New York: Morrow, 1980.
Christopher Hibbert is a renowned historian, biographer, and English writer. He has been known as a biographers’ pearl and has written a number of books. He makes it clear how unbelievable the period of the French Revolution as the events failed to stop amazing. Christopher Hibbert tries to cover a lot of content in his book concerning the French revolution. The last section of his book is a summary of the entire content. According to Hibbert, the purpose of writing this book included to provide a more decipherable introduction to other historians’ works. He real succeeded by employing that standard. Hibbert has written a basic summary regarding the most important persons and events of the French revolution which is very important for a leader to base further knowledge.
In his book, Hibbert maintains domination among the profusion of the histories regarding French revolution. A heralded author of more than twenty five biographical and historical studies, Christopher Hibbert shows complexly the related consequences in a logical, decipherable format and provides a lot of historical detail and background without sacrificing the narrative flow or clarity of the book. He wrote the book basically for the general leader who is not familiar with the history of French Revolution as he introduces them to individuals like Danton, Marie Antoinette, and Girondin, weaving their destinies together, and proficiently illustrating how they determined the Revolution as well as how the Revolution altered their lives. Hibbert uses illustrations, maps, a chronology of main events, a list of primary sources, and a glossary which supplement his eight chapters and prologue.
Hunt, Lynn Avery. Politics, culture, and class in the French Revolution. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
In her book, Professor Lynn Hunt has created a niche for exploring the mores, customs and morals of the subversive revolutionary forces while they attempted to legitimize their power seizure. This book gives a plentiful introduction on the French Revolution in which there is an exploration of the origins, evolution, and the ultimate decay of an effort that define France to the present day. Moreover, Hunt has done a variety of work looking for support in the existing statistics and the available documentary evidence to recognize the chief beneficiary as far as the revolutionary battle is concerned. For the enthusiasts of later revolutionary movements and social movements, Professor Hunt has posed many questions in her study concerning the organization and symbols of power.
Hunt spends her time looking at the marginalized in the society, for instance the landless individuals in the peasant class and the displaced artisans, to identify how those forces found their way to political life, prepared, made politically efficacious, and how they pressurize their leaderships and the way the leaderships reacted to the pressures, which forces one to downplay those social forces that were being used in a revolutionary period. However, great revolutions bring about all kinds of violent disturbances in the various societies that were in control or were dormant in the previous time, even though shakily. Because of that, a sure evidence regarding the existence of a pre-revolutionary condition is when a section of the previously ruling elite starts to make revolutionary disturbances, which is the value of Hunt’s study. According to Professor Hunt, all social or political movements have their symbols, customs, and rituals. Professor Hunt’s book contains a variety of fascinating cultural and social tidbits.
Kates, Gary. The French Revolution: recent debates and new controversies. London: Routledge, 1998.
This is a collection of major texts at the vanguard of the present day research and interpretation, which challenges orthodox assumptions regarding the origins, evolution, and the long-run historical effects of the Revolution. This volume includes a thorough and clear introduction which provides a context for the historical controversies, particularly those controversies since 1989. The constituent articles are interwoven into a sophisticated story which covers various areas like the inevitability of the Great Terror, resultant issues for the French History during the nineteenth century, the rational connection, the essential feminist dimension, and Napoleon’s later role. This kind of rewriting makes the new approaches about the Revolution to those individuals who are studying. This is possible because various scholarly debates occur in the issues of journals that are scattered which are therefore difficult to access. Kates article selected those articles with significant historical data about the French Revolution. Kates found this very beneficial, especially to those individuals who view French Revolution as an objective subject, so that to grasp the subject’s substantive aspects. Kates ensured that Marxist interpretation dominated throughout the collection to give an explanation for the causes and the resultant effects of the French Revolution. This collection also concentrates on feminist criticisms.
Lefebvre, Georges. The French Revolution. New York: Columbia University Press, 1965.
George Lefebvre is a renowned French historian because of his work about the French Revolution as well as his peasant life. This is one of his significant works which he wrote as a result of many years of research in the role of individuals in the peasant class over the revolutionary period. This book gives a plentiful introduction on the French Revolution in which there is an exploration of the origins, evolution, and the ultimate decay of an effort that define France to the present day. His work is a thorough and detailed examination of consequences of the French Revolution especially in the rural areas. Lefebvre’s work is based on a rigorous analysis of numerous registers, notary records, and the tax rolls of rural municipalities as he used the materials to trace the impacts of the abolishment of ecclesiastically tithes and feudalism, the movement of the middle class onto the rural areas, the effects of property transfers, and the devastation of the collectives rights within the villages of peasants.
It is this work that accounts for his ever growing interest to contemplate and engrave his own standpoints regarding the revolutionary matters that persistently influence events in the modern day. Lefebvre wrote this book from a standpoint which he sensed the individuals in the peasant class would have held during this time. He wrote most influential and more complex version of the French Revolution in the period between 1924 and 1959, which had not hitherto happened among historians. It is apparent that emphasized on French Revolution because of three fundamental roles which include the active involvement of the French nation in the French Revolution, to avoid the impact of the bourgeoisie on such involvement, and to influence the peasants to agree on the anti-capitalist manner of thinking.
Neely, Sylvia. A concise history of the French Revolution. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008.
This book gives a concise and yet plentiful introduction on the French Revolution in which there is an exploration of the origins, evolution, and the ultimate decay of an effort that define France to the present day. Neely gives a fabulous introduction to the French Revolution, which shows how specific political alternatives led to the revolution, reform, dictatorship, and terror. In her book, Sylvia Neely gives an explanation to the conflicting groups, complex events, and the rapid changes that described this particular period in the French history. Neely traces the significant transformations in society and government that impelled the French to find new methods of thinking concerning their place on earth, ultimately resulting to conservatism, terrorism, liberalism, and modern nationalism. Neely centers on the crucial political issues that enhances the French Revolution, and at the same time skillfully interweaving the social, intellectual, cultural, military, and diplomatic history of that time.
She gives an explanation on how the difficulty alternatives made by the revolutionaries and the imperial government alike induced the fall of the Ancien Régime and moved the country into growingly revolutionary policies, to Terror, and ultimately to the rise of the Napoleon Bonaparte. This work is written with nuance and clarity, and it provides a profoundly knowledgeable understanding regarding the available political possibilities during the French Revolution, putting them in a wide social context. Those readers who are interested in the revolutionary history of France will find the content of this book both occupying and rewarding. Therefore, Sylvia Neely’s book revisits on how the French Revolution started which is among the most debatable moments in history.
Tackett, Timothy. Becoming a revolutionary: the deputies of the French National Assembly and the emergence of a revolutionary culture (1789-1790). University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006.
Timothy Tackett is a renowned Professor of History. Tackett’s book is very important and helpful for any individual who is interested in the history of the French Revolution. According to Tackett, a number of historians have debated a primary riddle of the French Revolution which includes how a group of people without a conceptualized goal, split up in their backgrounds as well as their intentions, successful came together in a task that finally resulted in the subversion of the Old Regime. Within this thoroughly documented and persuasively argued study, Tackett has profoundly contributed to this historical debate. Tackett has used detailed charting of various transformations which took place during the historical period, and this provides a significant insight into how the reactions of individuals to the social interactions and political contingencies which they faced, finally subverted them.
Timothy Tackett’s book is an emblematic product of the craft of the historian as it exhibits a mastery of many sources which include 57 private and public archives. Depending on this evidential basis, Tackett talks about the key issues within the French Revolution’s historiography. By resourceful and exhaustive combing of libraries and archives across France, Tackett has brought to light more evidence regarding the viewpoints of the national Assembly members than any other person before him. It is apparent from this book that the final word has not been conclusively said even regarding those topics which an individual may think to know everything. Therefore, Timothy Tackett’s book revisits on how the French Revolution started which is among the most debatable moments in history.
