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Robespierre: A Revolutionary Life

by Peter McPhee

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882304,717 (3.3)None
For some historians and biographers, Maximilien Robespierre (1758-94) was a great revolutionary martyr who succeeded in leading the French Republic to safety in the face of overwhelming military odds. For many others, he was the first modern dictator, a fanatic who instigated the murderous Reign of Terror in 1793-94. This masterful biography combines new research into Robespierre's dramatic life with a deep understanding of society and the politics of the French Revolution to arrive at a fresh understanding of the man, his passions, and his tragic shortcomings.Peter McPhee gives special attention to Robespierre's formative years and the development of an iron will in a frail boy conceived outside wedlock and on the margins of polite provincial society. Exploring how these experiences formed the young lawyer who arrived in Versailles in 1789, the author discovers not the cold, obsessive Robespierre of legend, but a man of passion with close but platonic friendships with women. Soon immersed in revolutionary conflict, he suffered increasingly lengthy periods of nervous collapse correlating with moments of political crisis, yet Robespierre was tragically unable to step away from the crushing burdens of leadership. Did his ruthless, uncompromising exercise of power reflect a descent into madness in his final year of life? McPhee reevaluates the ideology and reality of "the Terror," what Robespierre intended, and whether it represented an abandonment or a reversal of his early liberalism and sense of justice.… (more)
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McPhee does a largely admirable job of documenting Robespierre's life, but the book is often lacking in context, leading any reader not thoroughly acquainted with the history of the French Revolution confused at times. ( )
  ihardlynoah | May 14, 2020 |
I adored McPhee's lectures on the French Revolution on Coursera and rushed to buy this book. Sadly, this rather blandly written biography does not measure up to his lectures. Throughout, overuse of passive voice (see sentence about actors on p. 75: "deemed" by Robespierre? the French in general?) and tendency to presume prior knowledge of figures, parties, or events (such as the Feuillants party, which is introduced on p.93 without mention of what it stood for until 113, two chapters later) made this a needlessly slow and at times confusing read for someone, like me, who does not bring to the book a detailed knowledge of the history of the period. Keep Wikipedia handy.

But the biggest failing is that the book does not bring any person other than Robespierre to life. Desmoulins, Danton, and so on are just names here. There is nothing here equal to Ruth Scurr's poignant evocation of the last days of Desmoulins in Fatal Purity. This makes for a comparatively dull book; more importantly, given McPhee's stated intention to recuperate Robespierre's reputation, it feels like stacking the deck to make such shadowy figures out of the Terror's victims. ( )
  middlemarchhare | Nov 25, 2015 |
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For some historians and biographers, Maximilien Robespierre (1758-94) was a great revolutionary martyr who succeeded in leading the French Republic to safety in the face of overwhelming military odds. For many others, he was the first modern dictator, a fanatic who instigated the murderous Reign of Terror in 1793-94. This masterful biography combines new research into Robespierre's dramatic life with a deep understanding of society and the politics of the French Revolution to arrive at a fresh understanding of the man, his passions, and his tragic shortcomings.Peter McPhee gives special attention to Robespierre's formative years and the development of an iron will in a frail boy conceived outside wedlock and on the margins of polite provincial society. Exploring how these experiences formed the young lawyer who arrived in Versailles in 1789, the author discovers not the cold, obsessive Robespierre of legend, but a man of passion with close but platonic friendships with women. Soon immersed in revolutionary conflict, he suffered increasingly lengthy periods of nervous collapse correlating with moments of political crisis, yet Robespierre was tragically unable to step away from the crushing burdens of leadership. Did his ruthless, uncompromising exercise of power reflect a descent into madness in his final year of life? McPhee reevaluates the ideology and reality of "the Terror," what Robespierre intended, and whether it represented an abandonment or a reversal of his early liberalism and sense of justice.

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