A brisk overview of French history by the author of Louis XIV and
Twenty Million Frenchmen (1970) and The Ancien Regime (1973).
Documentary and narrative rather than theoretical and polemic, this
quasi-novelistic epic encompasses a thousand years, from the first
Capetians in 987, and highlights successive revolts at home from
1789 to 1968, and political and military dramas abroad ranging from
The Hundred Years' War to the Pyrrhic victory of 1914 and the Vichy
legacy. Though Goubert has a tendency to worship the chart or graph
and make an oracle of the archive, there are nonetheless vivid
sketches of legendary historical figures such as Joan of Arc,
(Saint) Louis XI, Louis XIV, and Charles de Gaulle, supported by a
cast of characters including Lafayette, Talleyrand, and the
perpetual proletariat of French Revolution, the Paris student body.
Goubert's popularizing survey seems unlikely to prove the
definitive one-volume work. Even given tolerance of his vision of
history as primarily economic and political, his suspicion of
"intellotrends," and the book's tone of a Sorbonne primer, it's
hard to swallow a history of France in which Balzac and Chopin are
merely so much gossip and background music to the July Monarchy,
and Racine a poetic footnote to the Grand Siecle. (Kirkus Reviews)
This stimulating one-volume history traces the social and economic evolution of France as a nation from the founding of the monarchy in 987, to the present day.
Against a background of structural change, Goubert etches a vivid account of key events and personalities. His perspective is a popular one, and his main interest is in how political events and famous people affect the nation as a whole. The book incorporates the findings and perspectives of recent monographic studies with clarity and precision, but it is Goubert's own judgements, direct, forceful and iconoclastic, which make this an invaluable text.
eBook available with sample pages: 0203414683
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