The Great Cat Massacre: And Other Episodes In French Cultural History
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Condition: Good. Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears — some light scuffing and surface wear visible on the dust jacket. Pages: Good. Markings: No visible markings. The interior title page is clean and the binding appears intact.
A landmark work in cultural history, The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History by Robert Darnton presents a vivid and unconventional portrait of eighteenth-century France through a series of richly interpreted episodes. Drawing on folklore, artisan culture, philosophical manuscripts, and police reports, Darnton uncovers the hidden meanings embedded in the rituals, stories, and symbols of ordinary French life. Each chapter illuminates a different social world — from the peasants who told grimly violent fairy tales to the bourgeois readers who consumed the Encyclopédie — arguing that cultural artifacts are windows into the mental worlds of people long dead. Written with the precision of a historian and the storytelling flair of a novelist, the book champions an anthropological approach to history that transformed how scholars think about the past. A foundational text in the field of cultural history, it remains essential reading for anyone interested in how meaning is made and how societies understand themselves.
Author: Robert Darnton
Format: Hardback
Genre: European history
Condition remarks:
Condition: Good. Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears — some light scuffing and surface wear visible on the dust jacket. Pages: Good. Markings: No visible markings. The interior title page is clean and the binding appears intact.
A landmark work in cultural history, The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History by Robert Darnton presents a vivid and unconventional portrait of eighteenth-century France through a series of richly interpreted episodes. Drawing on folklore, artisan culture, philosophical manuscripts, and police reports, Darnton uncovers the hidden meanings embedded in the rituals, stories, and symbols of ordinary French life. Each chapter illuminates a different social world — from the peasants who told grimly violent fairy tales to the bourgeois readers who consumed the Encyclopédie — arguing that cultural artifacts are windows into the mental worlds of people long dead. Written with the precision of a historian and the storytelling flair of a novelist, the book champions an anthropological approach to history that transformed how scholars think about the past. A foundational text in the field of cultural history, it remains essential reading for anyone interested in how meaning is made and how societies understand themselves.