Book Launch - The French Revolution by Michael Sonenscher

Three questions have usually been asked about the French Revolution: why did it happen? why was it so violent? and what was its legacy? These questions seem to beg other, more conceptually ambitious queries about causation, violence or legacies. This book aims to answer both sets of questions by bringing together events and ideas. Michael Sonenscher draws on neglected aspects of eighteenth-century intellectual and political life and thought to demonstrate the importance of ideas for making connections between historical explanation and historical narrative.

Brisk, bracing and incisive, Michael Sonenscher’s The French Revolution is a thoroughly original interpretation of the causes, impact and legacy of the French Revolution. It should be essential reading for anyone interested in the Revolution and its legacy in the modern world.

Colin Jones, author of The Fall of Robespierre: 24 Hours in Revolutionary Paris

 

A lucid introduction to the French Revolution, as well as the most ambitious contribution to its historiography in many decades. Michael Sonenscher’s astonishingly original synthesis produces important new insights into all the classic questions raised by the events and ideas of the revolution, together with their complex legacies.

Isaac Nakhimovsky, author of The Holy Alliance: Liberalism and the Politics of Federation

 

Michael Sonenscher argues that ideas can be treated as evidence about what happened, and what did not happen, in the French Revolution. Renouncing counter-factual history, he assembles a comprehensive map of the intellectual terrain that made the revolutionary events possible.  This is the most intellectually exciting short book on the French Revolution you will ever read. 

Ruth Scurr, author of Napoleon: A Life in Gardens and Shadows

Event Timings

6:15pm - doors open

6:30pm - talk begins

7:00pm - Q&A

7:20pm - drinks and chat

Accessibility Information

Seating is available for 40 attendees (maximum) plus standing space. Some views may be partially obstructed by architectural columns, bookshelves, etc. but we aim to minimise this where possible. Space will be made available for wheelchair users. Access is via main entrance from street level and there are not steps or ledges.

There are 2 single-person bathrooms, including one large enough to fit a wheelchair with the door closed.

Please get in touch to reserve a seat, or if you have particular needs that you would like us to consider in advance.