The Forbidden Bestsellers of Pre-Revolutionary France Book + PRICE WATCH * Amazon pricing is not included in price watch

The Forbidden Bestsellers of Pre-Revolutionary France Book

More popular than the canon of the great Enlightenment philosophers were other books, also banned by the regime, written and sold "under the cloak." These formed a libertine literature that was a crucial part of the culture of dissent in the Old Regime. Robert Darnton explores the cultural and political significance of these "bad" books and introduces readers to three of the most influential illegal best-sellers, from which he includes substantial excerpts. Winner of the 1995 National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism.Read More

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  • Product Description

    What causes revolutions? How does public opinion influence events? This work answers these questions by asking what the French people read in the 18th century. The answer lies only partially in the canon of the great Enlightenment philosophers: Voltaire, Diderot, Montesquieu, Rousseau. More popular than these works were other books bought and sold "under the cloak". Salacious, blasphemous, often pornographic and treasonous, these formed a libertine literature that undercut all the orthodox values of the old regime. This history of these books, and of the booksellers who sold them, presents an idiosyncratic guide to the ancien regime and its citizens.

  • 0002558351
  • 9780002558358
  • Robert Darnton
  • 20 February 1997
  • Fontana Press
  • Paperback (Book)
  • 464
  • New edition
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