Liberty: The Lives and Times of Six Women in Revolutionary France

This is an excellent read for anyone interested in the female experience of the French Revolution. As the author and some of her subjects point out in the book the Revolution's cries for human rights and freedoms did not extend to women. I hadn't realized the Revolution was such a chauvinistic enterprise. Though women were denied the rights of citizens under the new Republic they were still made to suffer it's worst punishments, sometimes purely for their associations with personal enemies of people like Robespierre. The author looks at the evolution of France's Revolution through the lives of six women. The most famous are Germaine de Stael, doyenne of the salon, and Theresia Tallien embodiment of decadent Directory society. She begins with Germaine de Stael and a description of the fall of the ancien regime. The Revolution starts out with a liberal idealism that degenerates into the fatal Terror of 1793. The author does an excellent job of illuminating the downward slide of people's hopes, especially those of Manon Roland. Her narrative culminates with the rise of Napoleon and the Empire. This is a fascinating look at a turbulent time. I was left wondering about the Revolution--what was the point? One dictator (the King) was overthrown for another (the Jacobin Club and Robespierre), and then another (Napoleon). Women's rights were never seriously addressed by any of the supposed Republicans. In some ways women (primarily of the upper classes) were better off under the king. I highly recommend this for anyone interested in the French Revolution or women's issues.

Moore's book (which could also have been called "Equality," although not "Fraternity") may not break new scholarly ground, but it is fairly even handed on the more controversial aspects of the French Revolution and above all it brings to life a number of women who participated in that event and whose hopes for a more equitable life for women were dashed but who, often, continued to believe in the revolution's principles. She tells a number of good stories movingly, with flashes of humor and historically imaginative empathy for all concerned. The women she describes, or most of them (for the women she includes had a range of political views), would have been cheered by the recent Bastille Day celebrations, to say nothing of the mere fact of a woman's candidacy for the French presidency in the recent French election. This is a moving as well as an entertaining book.