The Raw and the Cooked, Or Why Politics Matters in ‘Babette’s Feast’

Despite its popularity as a “food film” and icon of the Slow Food movement, one must admit that Babette’s Feast (directed by Axel Gabriel, 1986) disappoints. In its saccharine treatment of the relations between Babette and her employers, Gabriel’s film fails to honor the spirit of Isak Dinesen’s original, published in the Ladies’ Home Journal in 1950 and subsequently reprinted in Dinesen’s final collection, Anecdotes of Destiny (1958). Why does this matter? Because in softening the edges of Babette’s character, the film ignores her political force and transformative potential—a force all the more urgent for the 2010s, when women from Sana’a to Seattle have been mobilizing for political change with astonishing energy and hope. “Babette” deserves better.

I believe Babette’s story is more interesting as a parable of specifically French politics than as a “food film,” and that it is indebted to two icons of French womanhood whose identities are deeply invested in food, fire, and revolution. In Dinesen’s heroine we can hear distant echoes of both the poissarde–the fishmonger or market woman of the French Revolution—and the pétroleuse or fire-starter of the Commune. “Babette’s Feast” allows the lineage from the poissarde to the pétroleuse to come into focus because its heroine is not only a cook she is also a former pétroleuse. And even if the politics of her past were muted by the film-maker in 1986, the relationship between food, fire and revolution is too potent a mix to ignore today.

The film’s shortcoming is unsurprising when one realizes how apolitical most interpretations of Isak Dinesen’s work and her heroine have been. In order to bring this lost subtext back into light, I am developing a short work that follows three moves: first, a quick glance at two moments in French political history will reveal the cultural work done by the poissarde and the pétroleuse in the revolutionary eras of 1789-94 and 1871. Second, textual analysis of culinary allusions and narrative asides in “Babette’s Feast” will demonstrate how Dinesen’s heroine incarnates both the pride of a culinary genius and the pétroleuse’s menace to society. Finally, a comparison of the story’s finale will show how the book’s heroine—unlike her avatar on the screen—transforms radicalism into a different kind of rigor, a more life-giving and artistic ambition than film-goers can see. In her portrayal of an appealing working–class woman who is both an unrepentant revolutionary and an authentic artist, Dinesen’s tale reveals a stronger affirmation of human potential than has yet been realized.

Any film-makers out there? Time for a remake, a truly revolutionary rendition of “Babette’s Feast.” Stay tuned for the fiery details…

Arab Protesters in the American Classroom: Notes on a Failure worth Repeating

Have you seen the Time magazine cover story by Kurt Andersen today? How great that “The Protester” was named Person of the Year for 2011! And how great that an Arab woman is the featured icon! Yet, as much as I applaud the thousands of people who swept through Tahrir Square in January and who continue to help move the revolution into permanent democratic reform in Egypt and elsewhere in the Arab world, I feel obliged to go on the record about a different kind of encounter with The Arab Protester that I witnessed this year, and which did not turn out so well. I’m not sure why, exactly, it failed. But two things are sure: the videoconference held between students of the University of Notre Dame and the American University of Cairo was a dismal flop. And I’d willingly do it again.

In preparation for our session in early November, students of both classes (my class on the French Revolution at ND, and a political science class at AUC) agreed on texts to prepare: chapter one of Samuel Moyn’s The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History and the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The idea was to discuss the origins and importance of human rights for democratic political progress. When the class convened, however, what ensued were mainly ad hominem attacks on American foreign policy uttered by classmates in Cairo who were visibly upset by the rise of military presence in their city streets, anxious about the potential for fraud in their imminent elections, and assumed that both were caused by a meddling superpower, namely the United States. They were seeking a target for their anger, and the eight Americas in my class were apparently good game. We got an earful. Although some of my students joined in the spirited discussion and appreciated the emotional tenor of this exchange which was truly “revolutionary,” others were unnerved by the anger it incited. One timid soul in my class was almost in tears, and later complained about the “unprofessionalism” of the event, saying that she wished she had never been there.

So why rehash this fiasco?

Because I think it is a good reminder that: 1) revolutionary groups are often violent; they need a target, and they may act in irrational ways. 2) revolutionaries may act irrationally even toward those people who are sympathetic to their feelings, if they are deemed insufficiently fervent in their support. Supporters need to do more than just voice their feelings; some kind of action is called for. 3) in order to be successful, revolutionaries need more than the infrastructure and communication skills outlined in the Time magazine article (p. 61), they also some human skills, e.g. an appreciation for history, an awareness of crowd behavior, and especially, mature leadership. 4) protesters may make for exciting viewing, and participating in a protest itself is good for the soul of any democratically-minded citizen. But it is exasperating to dialogue with a revolution-in-progress in the classroom. The calm, the ability to step back and seek perspective, are really difficult to achieve when a battle is raging outside.

Maybe I should lay off videoconferencing with AUC for a while. Teaching flesh-and-blood students in person feels hard enough on most days. But the memory of this event, as flawed as it was, remains the most powerful image of my past semester in the classroom. I suspect that a little anger and “unprofessionalism” are just what we need to bring human rights into living color… and incite some indignation right here at home.

Robespierre and Jean Ferrat, “Ma France”

A little over a year ago, the world lost a great man: Jean Ferrat, politically-committed singer, songwriter and town councilman of Antraigues-sur-Volane (Ardèche). All of those who have signed or are considering signing the Musée Robespierre petition (see September 10 posting), should take a moment to listen to Jean Ferrat’s song, “Ma France.” Read his obit, too, by Pierre Perrone, and think about the censorship that Ferrat suffered on French TV not so very long ago. As Perrone reminds us, Ferrat did not mince his words: “I don’t sing to pass the time,” Ferrat said and and sang in 1965. He later reflected: “I’ve never been a yes man for anybody. What really pleases me is that I reintroduced the great French poetry of writers like Aragon to the man in the street. I did that by going against the wishes of the music industry. They used to tell me that what I did was beautiful but of no interest to the general public. I proved them wrong but those idiots didn’t learn their lesson. They are still flogging crap to young people.”

What singers have taken up the fight for the ordinary working man and woman today in such lyrical ways?

The lyrics to “Ma France” include a cryptic reference to Robespierre; I’m not sure that I understand exactly what he means… But the rest of the song is a powerful anthem to the French land and French history far and near, in all its beauty and shame.
Ferrat’s words are intelligent, powerful and remain politically useful. May his warm baritone remain a presence in our lives for years to come. Enjoy!

Jean Ferrat, “Ma France”

De plaines en forêts de vallons en collines
Du printemps qui va naître à tes mortes saisons
De ce que j’ai vécu à ce que j’imagine
Je n’en finirai pas d’écrire ta chanson
Ma France

Au grand soleil d’été qui courbe la Provence
Des genêts de Bretagne aux bruyères d’Ardèche
Quelque chose dans l’air a cette transparence
Et ce goût du bonheur qui rend ma lèvre sèche
Ma France

Cet air de liberté au-delà des frontières
Aux peuples étrangers qui donnaient le vertige
Et dont vous usurpez aujourd’hui le prestige
Elle répond toujours du nom de Robespierre
Ma France

Celle du vieil Hugo tonnant de son exil
Des enfants de cinq ans travaillant dans les mines
Celle qui construisit de ses mains vos usines
Celle dont monsieur Thiers a dit qu’on la fusille
Ma France

Picasso tient le monde au bout de sa palette
Des lèvres d’Éluard s’envolent des colombes
Ils n’en finissent pas tes artistes prophètes
De dire qu’il est temps que le malheur succombe
Ma France

Leurs voix se multiplient à n’en plus faire qu’une
Celle qui paie toujours vos crimes vos erreurs
En remplissant l’histoire et ses fosses communes
Que je chante à jamais celle des travailleurs
Ma France

Celle qui ne possède en or que ses nuits blanches
Pour la lutte obstinée de ce temps quotidien
Du journal que l’on vend le matin d’un dimanche
A l’affiche qu’on colle au mur du lendemain
Ma France

Qu’elle monte des mines descende des collines
Celle qui chante en moi la belle la rebelle
Elle tient l’avenir, serré dans ses mains fines
Celle de trente-six à soixante-huit chandelles
Ma France

P.S. Thanks to Robert Fishman for bringing this great man and song to my attention.

Des Lumières à la Révolution, le bonheur en constitution, par Laurent Loty

Laurent Loty, Chargé de Recherche au CNRS, Paris, has contributed the following article which we reprint with great interest, in hopes of extending our longstanding dialogue Outre-Atlantique to other readers of A Revolution in Fiction.

« TOUS LES HOMMES SONT CREES EGAUX ; ILS SONT DOUES PAR LE CREATEUR DE CERTAINS DROITS INALIENABLES ; PARMI CES DROITS SE TROUVENT LA VIE, LA LIBERTE ET LA RECHERCHE DU BONHEUR. LES GOUVERNEMENTS SONT ETABLIS PARMI LES HOMMES POUR GARANTIR CES DROITS […]. TOUTES LES FOIS QU’UNE FORME DE GOUVERNEMENT DEVIENT DESTRUCTIVE DE CE BUT, LE PEUPLE A LE DROIT DE LA CHANGER OU DE L’ABOLIR ET D’ETABLIR UN NOUVEAU GOUVERNEMENT, EN LE FONDANT SUR LES PRINCIPES ET EN L’ORGANISANT EN LA FORME QUI LUI PARAITRONT LES PLUS PROPRES A LUI DONNER LA SURETE ET LE BONHEUR. »

DECLARATION UNANIME DES TREIZE ÉTATS UNIS D’AMERIQUE REUNIS EN CONGRES LE 4 JUILLET 1776, DITE DECLARATION D’INDEPENDANCE, TRADUCTION DE THOMAS JEFFERSON.

En quoi les Lumières et la Révolution française nous éclairent-elles sur le bonheur ? La Déclaration d’indépendance de 1776 puis la Déclaration des Droits de l’Homme et du Citoyen de 1789 jugent l’association politique à l’aune du bonheur ou du malheur qu’elle favorise. Les citoyens ne sont plus soumis à l’État, mais associés dans la recherche du bonheur. Ces préambules constitutionnels révèlent que la question si privée du bonheur est inséparable d’une dimension collective.

Ces textes nous indiquent aussi que l’on peut concevoir le bonheur autrement que ce mot le laisse penser aujourd’hui. La distinction entre Bonheur absolu et plaisirs de la vie n’est peut-être pas l’essentiel. Le caractère privé du bonheur est discutable. Et le bonheur ne se trouve pas au petit bonheur la chance. Petits ou grands, les bonheurs sont d’abord pluriels parce que les conditions du bonheur de chacun sont l’affaire de tous. À l’opposé d’une étymologie qui en faisait une bonne fortune, contre une idéologie religieuse qui en affirmait l’impossibilité, et par delà une croyance moderne qui en ferait un nouvel absolu qui tombe du ciel ou qui ne dépend que de soi, le bonheur est d’abord une affaire de solidarité, et de lutte collective contre la fatalité.

LE DROIT AU BONHEUR PAR LES PLAISIRS
Dans les Lettres philosophiques (1734), Voltaire magnifie la culture, l’économie et la politique anglaises contre l’intolérance et l’absolutisme français. Il s’oppose à Pascal, dont les Pensées (1670) justifient la souffrance par le péché et affirment que « Tous les hommes recherchent d’être heureux » et que « jamais personne, sans la foi, n’est arrivé à ce point ». Pascal estime qu’il y a plus à gagner en pariant sur l’existence de Dieu (la vie éternelle), qu’il y a à perdre (les plaisirs terrestres) : « Notre proposition est dans une force infinie, quand il y a le fini à hasarder, à un jeu où il y a pareils hasards de gain et de perte, et l’infini à gagner ». Or le mathématicien pipe les dés. Car si la vie éternelle n’existe pas, les plaisirs de l’existence sont notre seul bien, et leur perte un désastre absolu. Voltaire veut croire en un Dieu favorable au bonheur, et valorise amour de soi, désir de s’enrichir, jouissance des spectacles. Ces bonheurs relatifs sont désormais l’essentiel.

Les textes du 18e siècle se passionnent pour le bonheur: correspondances, traités (parfois intimes comme le Discours sur le bonheur d’Émilie du Châtelet), poèmes philosophiques, fictions. Des romanciers hésitent entre l’obsession du péché et la quête du bonheur (Prévost), mais la tendance est à célébrer l’amour ou la séduction (Crébillon fils). Et les chrétiens se laissent convaincre de la légitimité d’un bonheur terrestre.

LE DROIT DE S’OPPOSER AUX MALHEURS PUBLICS
Dans les Lettres persanes, Montesquieu critique le despotisme, métaphorisé par le sérail oriental. Roxane remplace la vertu religieuse par la vertu politique. Contre la soumission des femmes, violées par leur mari, elle défend son droit à aimer librement et se suicide en héroïne, tandis que Montesquieu interprète les suicides comme l’échec d’une société.

Le lien entre bonheur et liberté politique est aux fondements de la Déclaration d’indépendance, comme de la Déclaration de 1789 : « Les représentants du peuple français […] considérant que l’ignorance, l’oubli ou le mépris des droits de l’homme sont les seules causes des malheurs publics et de la corruption des gouvernements, ont résolu d’exposer, dans une déclaration solennelle, les droits naturels, inaliénables et sacrés de l’homme, […] afin que les réclamations des citoyens […] tournent toujours au maintien de la Constitution et au bonheur de tous . »

Ces textes incitent à réinterpréter le discours que Saint-Just prononce le 3 mars 1794 : « Que l’Europe apprenne que vous ne voulez plus un malheureux ni un oppresseur sur le territoire français ; que cet exemple fructifie sur la terre ; qu’il y propage l’amour des vertus et le bonheur ! Le bonheur est une idée neuve en Europe . » Ce propos découle d’une sensibilité religieuse, mais la sentence finale témoigne aussi du changement en cours : chacun a désormais le droit et le devoir de s’opposer à la fatalité et de propager le bonheur.

BONHEUR ET LAÏCITÉ DU MARIAGE
Dans Les Liaisons dangereuses (1782) de Laclos, la libertine estime que la dévote a remplacé la Religion par l’Amour. Cette réflexion est riche pour une histoire des mentalités. Mais la Révolution procède autrement que la dévote : la veille de la proclamation de la République est votée une loi autorisant le divorce. Ici, nul bonheur, grand ou petit. Mais la loi du 20 septembre 1792 libère l’institution du mariage, soulage des souffrances, rend l’avenir possible. Cette grande loi laïque s’inscrit dans l’immense révolution des relations entre les sexes. Elle dit ce que les Lumières peuvent apporter au bonheur. Qu’est-ce que les Lumières ? (1784) de Kant s’inscrivait dans un débat sur le mariage civil. Plus radical, Diderot avait rédigé sa conception des Lumières en forme de contes sur le malheur amoureux (Ceci n’est pas un conte et Madame de la Carlière), suivis d’un Supplément au Voyage de Bougainville (1774) qui prônait l’union libre et repensait les valeurs fondatrices des lois et des mœurs.

BONHEUR COMMUN ET BONHEURS DE CHACUN
Une nouvelle Déclaration introduit la Constitution de 1793 et affirme: « Article premier. Le but de la société est le bonheur commun », ce qui peut désigner l’harmonie du Tout, ou le bonheur de chacun en interaction avec les autres. La première conception, anti-humaniste, érige le groupe en transcendance. Elle réunit l’ultralibéralisme et l’ultracommunisme, frères ennemis depuis le 18e siècle.

L’ultralibéralisme est propagé à travers l’idée que Dieu a conçu le meilleur des mondes possibles, optimum qui néglige les individus. C’est l’« optimisme », doctrine religieuse et économique diffusée par Mandeville, réputé précurseur du libéralisme, ou par Voltaire qui, sauf dans Candide, est le plus grand propagateur de cette philosophie qui recommande à chacun d’accepter son sort . L’idée ultracommuniste du bonheur est diffusée dans certaines fictions utopiques qui se focalisent sur l’absence de propriété privée et en oublient les autres dimensions de la société. Aline et Valcour (1795) de Sade présente à la fois une utopie libérale où règne le bonheur des plus forts, et une utopie communiste censée faire le bonheur de tous. Mais Sade ne peut concevoir une association entre citoyens libres et éclairés, solidaires dans la recherche du bonheur de chacun.

Une autre voie existe, que je laisse aux lecteurs le soin de nommer. Elle s’exprime dans la Déclaration de 1789 et surtout de 1793 (inspirée par Condorcet et que le comité de Salut public écarte parce que la guerre exigerait la Terreur). L’association politique doit lutter contre les malheurs et pour le bonheur de chacun. D’où l’importance des impôts, de l’emploi, d’une sécurité sociale , et des articles sur les « secours publics » aux « citoyens malheureux » (« en procurant du travail »), sur les « progrès de la raison publique » (en mettant « l’instruction à la portée de tous les citoyens »), sur « la garantie sociale » qui « consiste dans l’action de tous, pour assurer à chacun la jouissance et la conservation de ses droits ; cette garantie repose sur la souveraineté nationale ».

UNE IDÉE NEUVE EN EUROPE
À l’exception des intégrismes religieux, nul ne niera aujourd’hui la légitimité de la recherche des petits bonheurs ou d’un grand Bonheur (Amour, Création, Savoir, Contribution au bonheur d’autrui…) Mais à l’heure où l’on croit que le bonheur n’est qu’affaire privée, l’entrée du « bonheur » dans la Constitution d’une Nation peut nous éclairer sur l’idée même de bonheur. D’autant que notre Constitution a récemment été modifée contre la volonté populaire exprimée lors du référendum de mai 2005 sur le Traité Constitutionnel Européen. On peut débattre des buts assignés à l’Europe par le TCE, mais chacun peut juger ce que signifie modifier une Constitution contre l’avis du peuple souverain. Les politiques économiques menées par les gouvernements des Trente Piteuses, accentuées par une conception non démocratique de l’Europe contredisent l’entrée du bonheur en Constitution. Espérons que nous trouverons les moyens démocratiques pour que le bonheur soit bientôt une idée neuve en Europe.

UNE PHRASE MAJEURE DU TEXTE
« LE BONHEUR EST D’ABORD UNE AFFAIRE DE SOLIDARITE, ET DE LUTTE COLLECTIVE CONTRE LA FATALITE »

LE SAVIEZ-VOUS ?
Selon la Constitution, le but de la société est de permettre la recherche du bonheur, qui dépend de l’entraide par l’impôt, l’offre d’emploi, l’instruction…

L’ESSENTIEL
Avec les révolutions américaine et française, le bonheur entre dans la Constitution. C’est le triomphe des Lumières, qui valorisent les plaisirs de la vie contre l’idée de péché. Mais c’est aussi une déclaration politique : un gouvernement n’est légitime que s’il permet la recherche du bonheur.

Cette idée invite à repenser l’idée même de bonheur. Le bonheur semble n’être qu’une affaire privée et ne tenir qu’au hasard, alors qu’il dépend de la solidarité et d’une lutte collective contre la fatalité.

La recherche du « bonheur commun » peut être anti-humaniste lorsqu’elle vise la Totalité sociale en négligeant les individus. Elle peut aussi être un appel à la lutte de tous pour le bonheur de chacun: ce bonheur dépend de l’association politique de tous les citoyens (grâce à l’impôt, l’instruction, la laïcité, la sécurité sociale, des politiques économiques, etc.).

Article paru dans Les Cahiers de l’Observatoire du bonheur, n° 2, « Bonheur et petits bonheurs », sous la direction de Michèle Gally, 2011, p. 12-15.

BIOGRAPHIE de Laurent LOTY
1982-1995 : enseigne les Lettres, participe à des réalisations artistiques et poursuit sa formation en histoire de la littérature et des sciences mathématiques, naturelles et humaines

1995 : achève une thèse sur La genèse de l’optimisme et du pessimisme et devient enseignant-chercheur à l’Université Rennes 2

1999-2002 : préside la Société Française pour l’Histoire des Sciences de l’Homme et publie le mot «indisciplinarité»

2002-2006 : crée le séminaire «Textes et Savoirs, Transdisciplinarité et Politique» et des programmes d’histoire des mots ou de rédaction de fictions utopiques, intègre le programme «Indicateurs Sociétaux de Bien-Être Territorialisés» de l’ONG PEKEA

2007-2009 : codirige Littérature et engagement pendant la Révolution française et Individus et communautés (revue Dix-huitième siècle)

2010 : entre au CNRS et prépare des livres sur des philosophies néfastes ou bénéfiques au bien-être de chacun et de tous.

Image: Rafael Canoga, Eduardo Chillida, Antoni Clavé, Jose Guerrero, Julio Le Parc, Matta, Robert Motherwell, Antonio Saura, Rufino Tamayo, Antoni Tàpies, Déclaration Universelle des droits de l’homme, article 3: «Tout individu a droit à la vie, à la liberté et à la sûreté de sa personne », 1984, estampe, eau-forte, 0,5m x 0,347 (© Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris).

Revolution Now: Keep Robespierre’s Memory Alive!

Since launching this site in 2009, and more recently agreeing to co-host a session on the Popular Culture of Revolution for ASECS 2012, I am increasingly convinced that pop culture is where the action is. The scholarly action and the political action. I have seen an astounding improvement in classroom dynamics when allusions to films, advertising, and “real-life” scenarios are brought to bear on historical topics. The articles on the Marie-Antoinette pager, Coppola’s film, and the Dolce & Gabbana “Hot Baroque” line systematically draw more hits than any other on this site. (The wildly popular Bastille Day quiz was a rare opportunity to make Revolution relevant to the non-initiate.) In a society where people consult their phones more frequently than their fellows, and where the president requests citizens to “twitter” their representatives instead of joining hands in traditional protest action, is it any wonder that we are increasingly drawn to ponder the instantaneous cyber-effects of cultural action?
One curious by-product of this situation is the call launched by the group known as Friends of Robespierre to demand that a museum be constructed in honor of the Incorruptible in his one-time home in Arras.
Headed by Alain Cousin (webmaster of the group; not to be confused with Alain Cousin, Deputy of the Manche district), this group is surprisingly effective. To date, more than 500 internautes have signed on (including yours truly). This has considerably grown the paper petition campaign which wielded 473 signatures so far.
To join forces with the Friends of Robespierre and demand a museum in his honor, or to learn more about this group’s activities, click here.
To be continued!

Why Les Miz is Bad for America, or the Illusory Self-Evidence of Solidarity

An old refrain has been reborn of late with startling potency. From talk show hosts to gubernatorial hopefuls, everyone has taken to quoting the Constitution or more precisely its first line: “We take these truths to be self-evident.” What truths? No matter. The refrain alone and its ironclad logic can push any platform, from bashing “Obamacare” and immigration rights to preserving birth control and public education. This sleight-of-hand in the name of Truth-telling is nothing new. In a long tradition of comic satire, from Shakespeare to Swift and Voltaire to Twain, writers have skewed familiar facts in the hopes of prompting a response. The most popular attempt at retelling History in our day is Victor Hugo’s best-seller of 1862 or rather its Broadway spinoff, now in its 26th year, Les Miz. If people were reading Hugo, things might not be so bad. But given that the vast majority of Americans no longer have the stamina to take on the 2,000-page original, we should be concerned. The message of Les Miz is bad for America.

Hugo’s novel Les Misérables revolves around the “self-evident” truth of human equality. Seventy years after the seismic shock of 1789, the French state had still failed to remake the judiciary into a system that would protect its citizens from arbitrary imprisonment, not to mention its failure to build open institutions of public education and social welfare. Solidarity is the goal of Les Misérables. Hugo assumed that the Revolution’s legacy of liberty and equality could be achieved through legislation and he weaves advice on such matters throughout the novel; but more important for him—and more tragic for his characters—was the unrealized promise of fraternity. The French Revolution rode on hopes that one day, people would realize that they need each other and so they would learn to care for one another despite differences in class, age, gender, or politics. The novel abounds in vignettes of hands touching hands, as coins, crusts of bread, and clothing change hands between the poor and the poorer, but beyond the Catholic Church (which sometimes has to be prodded into charity) there is no social net to catch any of them. Once Gavroche is slaughtered on the barricade, the people he once helped will likely starve.

If Les Miz had picked up on this theme, it may have had some redeeming value for American audiences today. The play as we know it, however, highlights a conventional love story, foregrounds the domestic drama, and warns against civic involvement. Hero Jean Valjean is portrayed as a long-suffering scapegoat of social injustice and his nemesis Javert skulks around behind him in suitably sinister fashion for no apparent reason. The tear-jerking tale of child Cosette, whose forlorn expression and wistful song have become synonymous with the story, overwhelms the larger plot even though it occupies only one-quarter of the book. Why does this matter? Because, beyond the “The Simpsons,” Les Miz is one of the few monuments on our cultural landscape that has the potential to bridge the generations, the classes, and the races that make up American society today. Twenty-six years later, the show is still playing to houses packed with families, school children, and more mature theater-goers. Yet with its scenes of thrilling young radicals running headfirst into an ill-conceived, suicidal clash with the army, it deals a cold blow to community activism. Who wants to fight, when activism=death?

Moreover there is an ambiguity in the word misérables. A misérable can be someone suffering from poverty and who is thus worthy of kindly pity, or it can designate someone whose indigence is a target for contempt. This wobbly signifier has a lot to do with why people liked the novel back in 1862 and, I think, why people still like it today. It has a lot to do with why the author tried so hard to argue for solidarity as a solution to the ills he portrayed, too. Hugo wanted Les Misérables to be a political document. Although he stops short of laying out a workable program for social reform, in its celebration of democratic action, it presents a paean to the working man and a visionary platform for social justice that later generations molded into policy during the Third, Fourth and Fifth Republics (policies which are currently under attack by the Right.) With its razzle-dazzle barricade scenes and tear-jerking adieux, Les Miz captures the excitement of hand-to-hand combat and the starry-eyed radicalism of its young characters—a virtue not to be underestimated in our cynical times. But in its conventional focus on the love stories and individual destinies of its principals, it ultimately makes political action look futile. This is the first reason why Les Miz is bad for America. It preaches civic disengagement.

Unlike the Broadway show, Hugo’s novel cannot be reduced to soap-opera earnestness. Its characters are complex. Jean Valjean and Javert are, as their mellifluous names suggest, mirror images of each other. Both struggle to live up to their ideals of human virtue: the one strives to incarnate Christian charity, while the other lives for the Law. Both are laudable, both serve commendable ends, yet both ideals prove fatal to the men, given the problems facing French society in the 1860s. It did not have to be that way. The scenes of suffering in Les Misérables were meant not only to elicit pity, but also to remind us that we too are abject, we too are implicated: none of us will escape unless we bring a change to our world. As Hugo would have known from reading Rousseau’s Social Contract, “He who believes himself the master of others does not escape being more of a slave than they.” Unfortunately, these traits have little to do with why Americans like Les Miz today, because the production glosses over the gritty, uncomfortable bedrock of Hugo’s epic to make suffering seem like somebody else’s problem. That is the second reason Les Miz is bad for America. It begs the problems raised.

Those “self-evident” truths that are now being touted by politicians did not grow naturally from American soil. They were a result of a long and messy process of democratic political action involving many people thinking, arguing, conversing, and writing together. The next time you hum along with Cosette’s song, “I Have a Dream,” think about the Truths that we Americans take to be self-evident as regards social equality, for instance, or the pursuit of happiness. Remember that free, public education was the crucial missing link to creating the vital workforce that has sustained our economy for generations, and that our nation was built to protect free-thinkers and immigrants seeking refuge. Remember that Hugo did not mean for his novel to be mere entertainment, rather Les Misérables was supposed to be a blueprint for social optimism, a snapshot of present ills that would incite a productive, collective demand for progress. We could do worse than to work on that wish: “Utopia today; flesh and blood tomorrow.”

Lady Gaga does the Revolution pretty well, actually

You have to check out the spoof Lady Gaga music video on the French Revolution! It is actually not too bad. Well it is not too bad, apart from the grating music, the annoying graphics, and the cavorting girlie girl who dances through the events. Although vastly oversimplified, the facts are not inaccurate.
I could not figure this out… how, or more precisely why would such an air-head media creature bother to make what appears to be a rather pedagogically useful rendition of the facts? The answer is simple. She didn’t! The video is the work of Hawaii educators Amy Burvall and Herb Mahelona, and it is one of dozens of history-themed videos the duo, under the name “history teachers,” has posted on the website YouTube.com. Read the story in the Honolulu Star Advertiser. Good job, history teachers!

Christmas gift for the revolutionary on your list

“Guillotine” is a card game set during the French Revolution. Slogan: “Le jeu de cartes révolutionnaire qui vous fera perdre la tête.” Your goal? Collect as many noble heads as possible to score enough to win. The game consists of three rounds, with each round consisting of twelve “hours” (collecting a head takes one hour). You will execute the noble first in line. But luckily, there are certain cards that allow you to change the line-up of the condemned, and so enable you to get a better head, or make your opponents get a worse one. Of course, there are certain heads that aren’t very good to “collect”. “Collecting” the martyr isn’t very smart, for example.

The game is rather quick, and very easy to learn. There are not many rules, and the few rules that exist are consistent and very basic.

Strength: Simple, quick, and fun.
Weakness: Can be hard to find a place to buy it. Card iconography bears little to no resemblance to historical figures, but rather a Disney-esque rendition wherein everyone is young and beautiful. Also deforms revolutionary history, of course, but that is a different matter.
My kids and I found it relatively amusing. And they do remember that 1793 is an important date…
Would probably be more fun in a classroom situation, as a reward to students after learning about the Revolution (and prompt them to point out its deformation of history).
Happy Holidays!

Canine punishment in revolutionary eyes

We know, or think we know, that the Revolution ushered in a period of unprecedented inhumanity. (That may or may not be true, judging from our recent study of the sentences handed down by the tribunal at Châtelet). To drive home the strangeness of 18th-century France, one might be wiser to turn to the revolutionaries’ attitudes toward man’s best friend.
Consider the following articles taken from La Chronique de Paris
No. 246, 4 septembre 1790
Weird human interest story about a woman, Mme Proust, whose little dog was bitten by a stray, and then got sick. So they threw her little dog in the river where it drowned. But she also had a cat. One day when she and her daughter were petting it, the cat bit her and ran away. She was attacked by “mouvemens convulsifs” and a desire to bite! They took her home, and she died “garrottée, dans des excès de rage affreux, & malgré tous les secours de l’art.” One hopes that her daughter will recover. This short article is followed by a complaint that the city is infested with stray animals.

No. 248, 6 septembre 1790
“Le malheur arrivé à la dame Proust & à sa fille, annoncé dans le no. d’avant-hier, est sans doute effrayant, & afflige les cœurs sensibles : mais il est étonnant que ces malheurs ne se multiplient pas plus dans cette grande ville.
C’est ordinairement les gens mal-aisés qui se prennent de belle passion pour les bêtes, & tel qui a bien de la peine à vivre, ou refuseroit un morceau de pain à l’indigence, nourrit quatre chiens & trois chats.
Voilà ce qui se pratiquoit avant la révolution, surtout dans les grandes chaleurs.
La police faisoit faire des rondes nocturnes, & on tuoit tous les chiens trouvés dans les rues : cette recherche sage diminuoit bien constamment le nombre des chiens pauvres & sans maître : c’est à coup sûr ces animaux abandonnés qui prennent la rage, qui attaquent ceux qui sont sains,& portent la désolation dans les familles.” Signé D.

Best wishes for the Year 209! Meilleurs vœux pour l’An CCIX!

As Year 209 (An CCIX) of the revolutionary calendar begins, we want to wish everyone a politically engaged new year. In honor of the event, we’ve published three icons of symbolic memory: 1) an illustrated decree from September 1792 (when the calendar was first implemented), 2) the front page from a revolutionary newspaper of a major event–11 Thermidor An II (July 29, 1794), and 3) the videoclip to a great pop song, “Ma liberté de penser” by Florent Pagny. .
The point is to remind us of what the Revolution meant then, and what it could still mean to us today, thanks to the enduring legacy of our free press and freedom of speech.
As Jeremy Popkin points out in his excellent Revolutionary News: The Press in France 1789-1799, the most important advance of the French Revolution was the summoning of common people to play an active role in government. This summons arrived in the hundreds of newspapers that were suddenly available in 1789 when censorship laws loosened, and which ultimately transformed the social landscape of France. “As the vehicle of the words and representations that made up revolutionary politics, the press was the great innovation that made the Revolution different from all earlier episodes in French history and thus opened the way to a modern political world” (Popkin 183).
We would do well to remember the power of the printed word today. Let us beware the media’s power to transform ephemeral moments into simplified symbolic stories, and to propagate the hate speech of the ignorant. But mainly let us avail ourselves of our right to free speech, and so speak up, write, text, or tweet, even if you may make a mistake or two along the way. Although our hyper-connected world makes public disagreement a constant source of tension, let us recall on this day of memory that disagreement is an inherent and legitimate part of democracy. Vive le désaccord!