The Coming of the French Revolution by Lefebvre, Georges

Princeton. 1989. Princeton University Press. Reprinted Paperback Edition. Some Red Penned Marking Inside, Otherwise Very Good in Wrappers. 0691007519. Translated from the French by R. R. Palmer. 325 pages. paperback. FROM THE PUBLISHER - To commemorate the bicentennial of the French Revolution. Princeton University Press presents the celebrated work ‘The Coming of the French Revolution with a new preface by the translator, R. R. Palmer. FROM THE TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE - ‘The present book was written long enough ago to have become a classic. It concerns only the beginning of the French Revolution. Its author, Georges Lefebvre. published it early in 1939 in honor of the sesquicentennial of the Revolution of 1789. A few months later the Second World War began. The French Republic collapsed before the assault of Hitlerite Germany, and was succeeded by the Vichy regime that governed France until the liberation in 1945. No sympathetic understanding of the French Revolution was desired by the authorities of Vichy France, which drew their strongest support from anti-republican elements that were then significant in French political life. The Vichy government therefore suppressed the book and ordered some 8,000 copies burned, so that it remained virtually unknown in its own country until reprinted there in 1970, after its author’s death. The present English translation appeared in 1947, as soon as possible after the Second World War. It has been widely read in English-speaking countries, where it is better known than in France itself. This new edition presents the translation of 1947 unchanged, but with a revised translator’s preface and a few small changes in the translator’s notes. What Lefebvre intended to mark the sesquicentennial of 1781 may now signalize its bicentennial fifty years later.’ inventory #40724 ISBN: 0691007519.