montagnarde1793 | Entries tagged with carnot

...But especially for that of

maelicia, I bring you a Carnot macro. Enjoy:

I don't know why it's so small. Hm. Hopefully it's still legible...?

Also, admire my new layout--and my new icon--for they are shiny.

ALSO, don't you hate it when you're minding your own business reading a biography of Robespierre and one of your friends comes up to you and starts talking about how interesting the subject of said biography is considering what a clinically insane, bloodthirsty dictator he was? Because this happened to me for the nth time yesterday, and everytime it happens I just want to say:

"Look, I have neither the time nor the energy to go into professor mode and give a lecture that you have neither the time nor the inclination to listen to explaining the entire history and historiography of the Revolution in order to give you enough background to allow you to understand why everything you just said is ignorant, reactionary, and just plain untrue. Moreover, you would probably attack me for attempting it the moment I open my mouth. So. Is this a subject you're genuinely interested in or were you just trying to be polite? Because if you're open-minded enough to really want to understand why I hold the opinions I do, I can recommend some books for you to read. Failing that, take this pamphlet [I still need to make some kind of handy pamphlet along the lines of "Robespierre and the French Revolution for Dummies"]. If you don't feel like reading it, that's fine, but kindly do not try to tell *me* what you learned in AP European History/The Scarlet Pimpernel/Simon Schama about Robespierre. I don't have the time."

Of course, what I really said was more like, "I don't believe that, but let's not argue. Have you done the Latin homework yet?"

*sighs*

Hamel, sometimes you're a bit crazy (Robespierre =/= Jesus, really!), but I love you anyway. Here's why (from page 482 of the third tome of his Histoire de Robespierre):

"Tout en reprochant à son collègue [Carnot] de persécuter les généraux fidèles, Maximilien, paraît-il, faisait grand cas de ses talents. Carnot, nous dit-on, ne lui rendait pas la pareille. Cela dénote tout simplement chez lui une intelligence médiocre, quoi qu'en ait dit ses apologistes. Il fut, je le crois, extrêmement jaloux de la supériorité d'influence et de talent d'un collègue plus jeune que lui [ou Saint-Just, qu'Hamel vient de discuter, ou Robespierre] ; et, sous l'empire de ce sentiment, il se laissa facilement entraîner dans la conjuration thermidorienne. Au 9 thermidor, comme en 1815, le pauvre Carnot fut le jouet et la dupe de Fouché."

"All while reproaching his colleague [Carnot] for persecuting faithful generals, Maximilien, it seems, thought much of his talents. Carnot, we are told, did not think the same of him. This quite simply denotes his mediocre intellect, whatever his apologists might have said about it. He was, I believe, extremely jealous of the superiority in influence and talent of a colleague younger than himself [either Saint-Just, whom Hamel just discussed, or Robespierre]; and, under the influence of this sentiment, he let himself be easily dragged into the thermidorian conspiracy. On 9 Thermidor, as in 1815, Carnot was the plaything and the dupe of Fouché."

Pwned.

Also, thanks to Hamel, I have a new theory about the origin of the "55,000" people supposedly executed by "the State" according to the BBC:

Page 473 of the third tome of the Histoire de Robespierre:

"C'est ce Montjoie [le "citoyen Montjoie, que dis-je ! [le] sieur Félix-Christophe-Louis Ventre de Latouloubre de Galart de Montjoie, auteur d'une Histoire de la conjuration de Robespierre"] qui prête à Maximilien le mot suivant: 'Tout individu qui avait plus de quinze ans en 1789 doit être égorgé.' C'est encore lui qui porte à cinquante-quatre mille le chiffre des victimes mortes sur l'échafaud durant les six derniers mois du règne de Robespierre."

"It's this Montjoie [the "citizen Montjoie - what am I saying! - Monsieur Félix-Christophe-Louis Ventre de Latouloubre de Galart de Montjoie, author of a History of Robespierre's Conspiracy"] which attributes the following words to Maximilien: 'Every individual who was more than fifteen years old in 1789 must have his throat cut.' It is again he who brings the number of victims who died on the scaffold during the last six months of Robespierre's reign to fifty-four thousand."

Now, first of all, did it never occur to this Thermidorian libelliste that Robespierre was himself over 15 in 1789? Second, I think it's rather plausible that the BBC just took this number and added another thousand to account for the 4-odd months of the Terror (or even just to round off the figure). Which is just sad. As Hamel goes on to say: "Y a-t-il assez de mépris pour les gens capables de mentir avec une tell impudence ?" ["Is there enough contempt for people capable of lying with such impudence?"]

To the BBC, I shall reiterate:

Is there enough contempt for people capable of lying with such impudence?

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Citoyenne la traductrice jacobine

Veillons au maintien de nos droits !

For your delectation...

Some notes from my reading

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October 2014

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