french revolution virtue and terror – part 2€¦ · french revolution virtue and terror – part...

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O’Neill Media: PN1997 .D35 1991

French RevolutionVirtue and Terror – Part 2

Week 02 – Lecture 0122 January 2008

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II. 1791

Turning point:No more dream of

“constitutional monarchy”

1791: June 20-21: “The Night of Varennes”: Royal family tries to escape

Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette (of Austria)“La Nuit de Varennes”: O'N Media PN1997.N92x 1983

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Deputy Target gives birth to the constitution of September 1791NB: A male gives birth! Viktor Frankenstein

III. 1792: “Radical phase” begins

Unified self v. Other:

External Enemies

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• 1) “Domestic”: September Massacres [1792] in Paris– V Frankenstein born

• 2) “Foreign”: French victory at Valmy calms tensions

• REPRESENTATION: Enemy is everywhere: in your neighborhood!

“L’ennemi est partout!”[The enemy is everywhere!]

• EXPORTING THE REVOLUTION: mission civilisatrice

• REPRESENTATION: “A Crusade against Counter-revolutionaries”: to liberate all Europe

– “Crusade”: medieval religion-- “liberate” from Holy Land from Islam– War against external enemies [“counter-revolutionaries”] permits the invention /

legitimation of self-identity over and against an “other”

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Phrygian cap --- worn by freed Roman slaves

The MarseillaiseArise you children of our patrie,Oh now is here our glorious day !Over us the bloodstained bannerOf tyranny holds sway !

Oh, do you hear there in our fieldsThe roar of those fierce fighting men ?Who came right here into our midstTo slaughter sons, wives and kin.

To arms [aux armes], oh citizens ! Form up in serried ranks !March on, march on !And drench our fieldsWith their tainted blood !

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Albertville 1992 Opening Ceremony

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTuy9kW1UKk

Start at 4:02 --- notice the white dove of PEACE!!!

The Marseillaise

Arise you children of our patrie,Oh now is here our glorious day !Over us the bloodstained bannerOf tyranny holds sway !

Oh, do you hear there in our fieldsThe roar of those fierce fighting men ?Who came right here into our midstTo slaughter sons, wives and kin.

To arms [aux armes], oh citizens ! Form up in serried ranks !March on, march on !And drench our fieldsWith their tainted blood !

IV. 1793: Regicide

Disorder at the Center:

Pollution, Purity and Danger

Cf. Earlier examples of anthropological anxieties:Uccello, Burning of the Jews

Gargoyles: sacred center / dangerous edgesLuther: pope as monster excrement

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• Jean-Paul Marat: Leader of the radical Montagnard faction

• 1793: July 13• Assassinated in

his bath by – Charlotte Corday, a

young Girondinconservative.

Jacques Louis David, Marat Assassinated

[1793]

counter-revolutionary / conservative forces

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1793• October 28: Marie

Antoinette guillotined for “promiscuity” [esp. incest]

• QUESTION: Why would you kill your father and mother???

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Imaginary “Center” of the NationCartesian Order --- Sexual Disorder

PURITY --- POLLUTION

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Tabula rasa: Dechristianisation program

The Republican Calendar: Adopted by Convention of Oct. 1793

Re-naming the months

Referents are “natural”

[i.e., not mythological / Xtn]

cf,. Rousseau: “natural” = “primitive”; “innocent”; “objective”; not sullied by “civilization” or “culture”

Again: cf. Frankenstein

RATIONALITY:

12 Months

30 days each

Three ten-day weeks [décades]

10th day = day of rest

5 days left over at end of year:

the “sans-culottides”

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What’s in a name??????????

Proper address: “Citizen X” … [cf. Soviets: “Comrade”

NOT based on gender “Monsieur”; “Madame”; “Mademoiselle”

or “Estate”: “Monseigneur” [“My Lord”]; “Père” [“Father”]; “Soeur” [“Sister”]

Elimination of “de” --- signifies aristocracy [Duc d’Orleans; Duc de Lubac; Dumortier

Children’s names --- no longer saints’ names [Pierre; Michelle; Jean-Marie]

Rather, natural referents: “Goldenrod”; Marigold”; “Seedling”; Rosebud”

V. 1793-1794

Robespierre: Virtue imposed by Terror

“Terror is nothing other than justice: prompt, severe, inflexible.”

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Maximilien de Robespierre:

“The Incorruptible”

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• Rousseau: “A Republic of Virtue”; the “Regeneration of Man”

• Robespierre: the total regeneration of man requires both virtue and terror [cf. Lenin]

• Two-pronged strategy:• 1) “family values”: e.g.,

republican motherhood• 2) guillotine: ridding body

politic of infection

July 1793- July 1794: Robespierre principal director of the

Comité de salut public[Committee on Public Safety]

A. Clément,La France Républicaine

[Republican France]

•• VirtueVirtue• Breasts:

– motherhood– Virgin Mary

• Rooster: ancient symbol of France [the Gallican rooster]

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Rousseau’s “Regenerated Man”Completely virtuous

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9akAroGKuEs

Grey’s Anatomy

Melodrama

starts from

and

expresses

the anxiety brought by

a frightening new world

in which the traditional patterns

of moral order

no longer provide

the necessary social glue . . .

Trauma: a collective encounter with chaos…

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Melodrama

plays out the force

of that anxiety

with

the apparent triumph

of villainy,

and it dissipates it

with

the eventual victory

of virtue.

Cf. Purity [virtue] and

danger [villainy]

Rousseau’s “Regenerated Man”Completely virtuous

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Georges Jacques Danton

• Robespierre a puritan: “family values”

• Danton: more popular rival– not at all puritanical– must be eliminated– Guillotined: 5 April 1794

O’Neill Media: PN1997 .D35 1991

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June 20, 1794: Feast of the Supreme Being

[June 21 = St. John Baptist / Solstice]

20 June 1794:

Feast of the Supreme Being

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Notre-Dame de Strasbourg

Converted into a

“Temple of Reason”

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Cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand: “The French People

recognize the Supreme Being and the immortality of the soul.”

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Tabula rasa: Dechristianisation program

The Republican Calendar: Adopted by Convention of Oct. 1793

Francis Poulenc, Dialogues of the

Carmelites

17 July 1794

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Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Mercy,

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our life, our sweetness and our hope, Hail! [salve]

our life, our sweetness and our hope, Hail! [salve]

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Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Mercy,

Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Mercy,

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our life, our sweetness and our hope, Hail! [salve]

To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve;

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to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping; [repeat]

in this valley of tears [in had lacrimarum valle]..

Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us;

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And Jesus, blessed fruit of thy womb, Show unto us after this our exile ,

O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary.

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O clement ….

O loving …. O sweet, virgin, Mar -------

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Glory be to the Father, and to the Son who from death is risen …

and to the Paraclete … into eternity of eternities … [Doxology for Eastertide]

into eternity …

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Caricature:

Robespierre

executes

the executioner

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“This is all of France”

Constitution of 1791

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“Thermidorian Reaction”:

Coup of 9 Thermidor

(July 27, 1794)

Robespierre shot in the jaw

Beheading of Robespierre:

10 Thermidor

28 July 1794

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The TerrorA desperate effort to stabilize

subjective individualism into a community where

they will be interconnected and care for one another.

Inherent instability of “subjective individualism”

– On the one hand: the individual person as the ordering principal and source of all value

• PROBLEM: not just one will but many!

– Thus: individual is source of instability and disorder

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First topic of semester:Comparing the American and French

RevolutionsTwo revolutions

↓Two visions of “democracy”

↓Two visions of “unity”

↓Two visions of “human nature”

[Phil. Core: “Phil. of the Person”]

Dissent and factions essential

Prevent tyranny of majority over individual (minority) wills

Human nature/reason fallible

Dissent and factions not allowed

Contrary to idea of “social compact”

Human nature/reason both innocent and ever-progressing

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Virtue v. Villainy: must virtue’s victory be forcibly imposed???