It's Halloween. Therefore, I am presenting you with a "scary" Haloween-themed picture. This blog posting, however, is not about Halloween, but about a book on the French Revolution. That book, as it turns out, is rather scary, too - at least that has been my reaction. I found it "scary" because it made me think about our upcoming presidential election, and about what happens after that. That is really a "scary" subject.
I have been writing blog postings for a long time, and I publish one blog posting every day. I am deep into my fourteenth year, and that means I have published over 5,000 individual blog postings so far. Given that fact, it is not surprising that I have mentioned the French Revolution before. I mentioned it, specifically, on September 28, 2022, a little over two years ago. The title of that past blog posting was, "A New World Begins." You can still read that blog posting, if you'd like to. All you have to do is click that link.
The past blog posting to which I have just referred was a kind of "book review." I found a copy of A New World Now Begins in one of those "Little Free Libraries" that I like to visit, and I learned a lot when I read it - a lot more than I thought I would. You will have to visit the earlier blog posting to see the list I came up with.
Today, I want to alert you to another worthwhile book on the French Revolution, It's by Robert Darnton, and it is titled, The Revolutionary Temper: Paris, 1748-1789. If you click that link, you'll be delivered to a book review in The Guardian.
Let me be clear that I did not pick up the Darnton book from a Little Free Library - but I didn't pay for it, either, which is nice, since the price is listed at $45 on the dust jacket. A friend, who had read the book, gave it to me, gratis. And he said I could keep it (and underline it), which I did!
Here is how that book review from The Guardian begins:
Histories of the period conventionally begin with the storming of the Bastille prison, hated symbol of royal tyranny, by Parisian commoners on 14 July 1789. Darnton, who built his reputation as an inventive, often iconoclastic historian in works such as The Great Cat Massacre, turns the conventional narrative upside down. Where other historians ask what made the revolution, looking to economics, ideology and outstanding personalities, The Revolutionary Temper asks what made the revolutionaries .... Going back 50 years before 1789, Darnton tracks the transformation in values that led ordinary Parisians to believe, in spite of everything they knew, that the will of the people could break the power of kings (emphasis added).
Please note, as a kind of aside, that Darnton (in what Wikipedia says is his most popular book) thinks that "cats" can provide important clues to the politics of the day. As you will remember, I am sure, J.D. Vance, the Republican Party candidate for vice-president, more or less surprised everyone when he launched a rhetorical attack on "childless cat ladies." It turns out, as I surmise from the Wikipedia article I linked above, that hatred of cats (among certain trade workers) played a part in the run-up to the French Revolution. Let me save a detailed discussion of that for another time - or not. If it turns out that the Trump-Vance ticket wins the election on November 5th, looking into that subject might be quite pertinent. Otherwise, I think I might let you do your own research.
In The Revolutionary Temper, Darnton makes the following observation (in the "Introduction," on Page XVII):
Events do not come naked into the world. They come clothed - in attitudes, assumptions, values, memories of the past, anticipations of the future, hopes and fears, and many other emotions. To understand events, it is necessary do describe the perceptions that accompany them, for the two are inseparable....
"Event history" has been deprecated for decades by professional historians ... but it is undergoing a revival, and it can be reworked, I believe, not simply as a record of what happened but as a way to understand how people made sense of happenings.... (emphasis added)
In other words, Darnton says things like "the great cat massacre," one of those "events" that he claims are typically "deprecated" by historians, are important because they help us learn "how people make sense of what's happening." That's critically important because people's "sense of what's happening" is key in determining what actually does happen. A "revolutionary temper" leads to revolutionary acts, and then a "revolution" will follow from those acts.
So, what's so "scary" about this rather self-evident observation, in the context of our politics today? Well, with November 5th close at hand, please remember that some have predicted that there will be a "Civil War" if Donald Trump loses the upcoming election. Former president Trump has been masterful in convincing millions of people that a sense of resentment about the United States government is absolutely appropriate, that things are "terrible," and that "he alone can fix it."
To the extent that people really believe this - that this politically-linked resentment of our own government is an accurate "sense of what's happening" in our nation today, a "sense" that resonates with millions of people - then Trump's loss of the election might well precipitate actions that will make January 6, 2021, seem minor in comparison.
I think Trump's description of our national and international reality is best described as a "fever dream," but what if millions share that fever dream (and I am afraid that might well be true)? What if Trump supporters share his outraged and grievance-driven "sense of what is happening"?
Well, we will soon find out. It's Halloween today, but that "scary" image, above, is all too appropriate, I think, not only to our Halloween holiday, but to the upcoming election - and to what might happen after.
I am keeping my fingers crossed that our fever-dreaming former president loses the election - and the consequence is that the fever breaks for the nation at large.
I am scared about other possible outcomes, too (whatever happens with respect to a Trump win or loss)!
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