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HISTORIANS OF GENIUS: THOMAS CARLYLE
BBC Two: Thursday 21 October 2004 11.20pm-12.15am
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Bill Paterson recounts the descent of high ideals into the turmoil of the Terror, in the words of Thomas Carlyle.
Title: The French Revolution
Published: 1837
Background: The book covers the period from the death of Louis XV to Robespierre's quelling of the Vendemiaire rebellion. In undeniably powerful prose, Carlyle depicts the fall of the Bastille, the murder of Marat and the attempted escape of the royal family.
Quotations:
"France was a long despotism tempered by epigrams."
History of the French Revolution, Pt I, Bk I
"The seagreen Incorruptible..."
Referring to Robespierre History of the French Revolution, Pt II, Bk IV
"Macaulay is well for a while, but one wouldn't live under Niagara."
Notebook
Facts:
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Carlyle studied at Edinburgh University but left without a degree
- He experienced a crisis of faith in 1821 and described it in Sartor Resartus, otherwise known as Tailor Retailored
- After the death of his wife Jane, Carlyle published his Reminiscences in which he regretfully accused himself of having treated her badly
- Carlyle was friendly with the philosopher JS Mill who, having borrowed the manuscript of volume one of The French Revolution, destroyed it by mistake in 1835. Carlyle had to rewrite the work and published two years later
- Although it was proposed that he be buried in Westminster Abbey, Carlyle was interred according to his wishes in his birthplace of Ecclefechan, near Dumfries
Other key works: On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History (1841), The History of Frederick the Great (1858-65)
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