The Road from Versailles: Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and the Fall of the French Monarchy - Softcover

Price, Munro

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0312326130 ISBN 13: 9780312326135

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin, 2004

Synopsis

What becomes of leaders when absolute power is wrested from their hands? How does dramatic political change affect once-absolute monarchs? In The Road from Versailles, acclaimed historian Munro Price confronts one of the enduring mysteries of the French Revolution: What were the true actions and feelings of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette as they watched their sovereignty collapse?

Dragged back from Versailles to Paris by the mob in October 1789, the king and queen became prisoners in the capital. They were compelled to publicly approve of the Revolution and its agenda, but, in deep secrecy, they began to develop a very different and dangerous strategy. The precautions they took against discovery, and the bloody overthrow of the monarchy three years later, dispersed or obliterated most of the clues to their real goals. Much of this evidence has until now remained unknown.

The Road from Versailles reconstructs in detail, for the first time, the king and queen's clandestine diplomacy from 1789 until their executions. To do so, it focuses on a vital but previously ignored figure, the royal couple's confidante, the baron de Breteuil. Exiled from France by the Revolution, Breteuil became their secret prime minister, and confidential emissary to the courts of Europe.

Along with the queen's probable lover, the comte de Fersen, it was Breteuil who organized the royal family's dramatic dash for freedom, the flight to Varennes. Breteuil's role is crucial to understanding what Louis and Marie Antoinette secretly felt and thought during the Revolution. To unlock these secrets, Munro Price draws on highly important unpublished and previously unknown material.

Meticulously researched and utterly fascinating, The Road from Versailles provides fresh insight into some of the most controversial events in modern history.

About this title

About the Author:

Munro Price was born in London and educated there and at Cambridge, where he received his Ph.D. He specializes in eighteenth-century France and the French Revolution and has lived and taught in Lyon and Paris. He is currently a Reader in History at the University of Bradford. The Road from Versailles is his third book.

From Publishers Weekly:

Historians have long argued about the true intent of Louis XVI regarding the French Revolution. Was the king prepared to accept a limited monarchy or did he intend to restore the old regime? Price, a specialist on 18th-century France, has unearthed a treasure trove of vital material-memoirs, diaries, official documents and correspondence-connected with the diplomatic representatives of the king, in particular the Baron de Breteuil, the king's prime minister in July 1789, when a Parisian mob stormed the Bastille. With the royal family in prison, Breteuil secretly traveled all over Europe with two goals: to help the royal family escape from Paris and to restore the absolute monarchy. Price takes us inside the world of 18th-century diplomacy, showing Breteuil's attempts to win financial and military backing from Austria, Sweden, Russia and other European monarchies. In June 1792, the royal family attempted its famous failed escape to Varennes. Breteuil eventually gained military support from Marie Antoinette's native Austria. Both Austria and Prussia invaded France in 1792, but were surprisingly defeated at the Battle of Valmy. The king was tried and executed in January 1793, Marie Antoinette shortly thereafter. What Price proves beyond doubt is that Louis had numerous chances to compromise with the revolution. He refused, choosing instead an ill-fated agenda of restoring absolute monarchy. This exhaustively researched study should be the definitive diplomatic history of the fall of Louis XVI. 16 pages of color photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0312326130
• ISBN 13: 9780312326135
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 448