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Media Notes

MediaNotes / The French Revolution in Fiction

Media set during The French Revolution (1789-1799).

It overlaps with The Napoleonic Era in Fiction whenever it concerns Napoléon Bonaparte (until his coup in 1799).

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Anime & Manga 

Art & Architecture 

  • Much of the work of Jacques-Louis David, an active participant in the Revolution who produced official propaganda paintings and private portraits of many of the "celebrities" of his day. Particularly well-known are the iconic Marat assassiné and his quick sketch of Marie-Antoinette just before her execution. His massive Serment du jeu de paume (1791) to commemorate the Tennis Court Oath of 1789 was never finished, in part because many of the politicians on it fell into disgrace and were guillotined.
  • The revolution was rediscovered in a big way by historical painters during the Third French Republic, which often invoked its memory after the traumatizing defeat against a unifying Germany in the Franco-Prussian War.
  • The Arc de Triomphe, or to give it its full name: the Arc de triomphe de l'Etoile in Paris commemorates the Wars of the French Revolution as well as the Napoleonic Wars. Of special note is the group of figures "The Depart of the Volunteers of 1792" by Francois Rude.
  • The Panthéon of Paris was set up as a burial place for "the great men" of France during the Revolution. Inside several groups of figures were added during the Third Republic, including "The Battle of Valmy", Le Vengeur, "The National Convention", and "The generals of the Revolution", as well as a painted tryptich Vers la gloire by Edouard Detaille in honour of the armies of the revolution.

Comic Books 

  • Batman Reign Of Terror is a Elseworlds Batman story set during the French Revolution with Bruce Wayne as a French nobleman who becomes a masked crimefighter carrying convicted innocents out of France, a la The Scarlet Pimpernel.
  • The Sandman (1989): The story "Thermidor" is a dark tale set in the aftermath of the French Revolution.
  • The Sky Over The Louvre, by French bande-dessinee artist Bernar Yslaire and famous screenwriter Jean-Claude Carriere (who also wrote the famous film Danton). Commissioned by the Louvre itself, this comic explores the founding of the museum during the Revolution through the Odd Friendship between Robespierre and painter Jacques-Louis David.

Fan Works 

Films — Live-Action 

  • Adieu Bonaparte is about the seldom depicted campaign of General Napoléon Bonaparte in Egypt that started in 1798 when France was under the Directory, when the "ideals" of the Revolution were "exported" (via military campaigns).
  • Les Belles De Nuit (1952), a René Clair comedy starring Gérard Philipe as a music teacher going back in time in his dreams, with a stop during the Revolution.
  • Brotherhood of the Wolf: The Revolution Bookends the film, with an older Thomas d'Apcher who's facing the wrath of a popular mob, since he's a nobleman.
  • Chouans, a 1988 film by Philippe de Broca, tells the story of an aristocratic family in Brittany torn asunder between its royalist and republican members.
  • Danton, directed by Andrzej Wajda and starring Gérard Depardieu as Danton in the face-off with Robespierre. It is based on the play "The Danton Case" by Stanislawa Przybyszewska which Wajda had alread produced on stage in Warsaw in 1975. The film was originally commissioned by the Mitterand government, but Wajda presented a much too dark image of the year 1794 for their liking, likening Paris during the Terror with Poland during the repression of the Solidarity movement.
  • Farewell, My Queen a 2012 French film starring Diane Kruger as Marie-Antoinette. It explores Versailles in the first three days of the Revolution.
  • The French Revolution, a 1989 Epic Movie produced for the 200th anniversary of the Revolution. Noteworthy for being surprisingly neutral in regards to the events. The movie is divided into two parts, La Révolution française: les Années lumière ("The French Revolution: The Years of Hope") and La Révolution française: les Années terribles ("The French Revolution: The Years of Terror"). The first half, directed by Robert Enrico, begins with a brief prologue in 1774 before skipping forward to the summoning of the Estates General and then following events through to the deposition of Louis XVI. The second half, directed by Richard T. Heffron, focuses on the Reign of Terror, picking up where the first one left off and ending with the execution of Robespierre.
  • History of the World Part I lampoons many of the clichés about the French Revolution in the relevant section.
  • Jefferson In Paris, a biopic of Thomas Jefferson during his time as Ambassador in France, showing the events leading up to the French Revolution.
  • The Lady And The Duke, a French film by Eric Rohmer, starring Lucy Russell and Jean-Louis Dreyfuss showing the events from the perspective of Philippe Egalite, Duc d'Orleans and his mistress Grace Elliott.
  • Mademoiselle Désirée, a 1942 French film focusing on Désirée Clary, the first fiancée of Napoleon, who got dumped by him so he could be with Joséphine de Beauharnais instead. Désirée's family was part of the bourgeoisie, their intermediary role between the riches of the nobility and the absence of Blue Blood of the common folks amidst the changing social landscape of the Revolution is highlighted by her father early on.
  • Marie Antoinette (1938), starring Norma Shearer and Robert Morley.
  • Marie Antoinette (2006), directed by Sofia Coppola with Kirsten Dunst portraying the titular queen. It follows Marie-Antoinette's life from her marriage to Louis XVI to the beginning of the Revolution.
  • The Married Couple of the Year Two (1971), a comedy starring Jean-Paul Belmondo as a man who returns to Nantes during the Reign of Terror to get a divorce from his estranged wife and ends up navigating between the fronts of various revolutionary and royalist factions. One of the few movies involving the Revolution that does not contain a single scene set in Paris.
  • La Marseillaise (Jean Renoir film). 1938 film which chronicles the early years from Bastille to the Storming of Tuileries and ending at the Battle of Valmy. Features costumes by Coco Chanel, a shadow theatre scene by exiled German animation pioneer Lotte Reiniger and amazing battle scenes. The linking thread is the development and Memetic Mutation of the song that would become France's National Anthem in a fictionalized portrayal of the volunteer battalion from Marseilles that brought it to Paris.
  • Napoléon (1927), a French silent Epic Movie directed by Abel Gance, who himself appears in the film as Saint-Just. As Napoleon is the hero, he gets inserted into scenes not based on history, such as the already completely inaccurate scene of the first performance of the Marseillaise in Paris (it was composed and first performed in Strasbourg) which finishes with captain Bonaparte shaking Rouget de Lisles's hand and congratulating him for his good work for the republic.
  • Napoleon (2023). The film starts in 1793 with Marie-Antoinette's execution during the Reign of Terror, then features the Siege of Toulon where Napoléon Bonaparte had his first major feat of arms, the fall of Robespierre, the [[13 Vendémiaire revolt, the Egypt campaign, and Napoleon's coup in 1799.
  • Orphans of the Storm (though the original novel which was adapted was not set in this time period)
  • Reign of Terror (or The Black Book a 1949 B-Movie done in a Film Noir style. The Reign of Terror is used as a stand-in for the Red Scare during The Hollywood Blacklist and features an impressive lack of historical accuracy of any kind.
  • Scaramouche (1923)
  • Scaramouche (1952)
  • Start the Revolution Without Me
  • Stay Tuned: The protagonist fall into this setting on one of the channels.
  • That Night in Varennes, a film by Ettore Scola which tells the story of the Flight to Varennes and the early phase of the French Revolution as seen through the eyes of the passengers of a stage coach that happens to follow on the tracks of the royal family's coach. The passengers mixes fictional characters such as a lady of Marie-Antoinette's court (Hanna Schygulla) with real-life writers Rétif de la Bretonne (Jean-Louis Barrault), Thomas Paine (Harvey Keitel), and Giacomo Casanova (Marcello Mastroianni).
  • Vaincre ou Mourir: The Vendée Civil War during the Reign of Terror in 1793-1796, with the royalist insurgency commander François Athanase Charette de La Contrie as protagonist.
  • Les Visiteurs. The medieval knight Godefroy of Montmirail and his squire Jacquouille have been sent to this era by mistake at the end of the second film, The Corridors of Time. The third film, Bastille Day, deals with their fate as they are stranded in 1793 during the Reign of Terror.

Literature 

  • Mémoires d'un médecin ("Memoirs of a Physician", but also known as the Marie-Antoinette series) is a tetralogy dealing with the years leading to, and during the Revolution. The first book, Joseph Balsamo famously featured a secret society who meet in a mountain and promise to usher in the Revolution. It is followed by The Queen's Necklace, Ange Pitou (also known as "The Storming of the Bastille"), and La Comtesse de Charny. The story is then continued in Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge. In order to show the amount of research he put into his novels, Dumas also did a non-fiction book with the account of how he retraced the Flight to Varennes, discovering errors in famous historians' accounts and interviewing the few surviving eye-witnesses he could still find in the region.
  • Blanche de Beaulieu is a love story between General Marceau and a young aristocrat against the backdrop of the war in the Vendée. The author's father, revolutionary General Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, also makes an appearance.
  • The Woman with the Velvet Necklace, takes place during the Terror. In reference to Moral Event Horizon, it mentions the execution of King Louis as "the single most important event in human history to date."
  • Dumas finally wrote a trilogy of novels about royalist conspirators during the Revolution and Napoleonic Wars: Les Blancs et les Bleus, Les Compagnons de Jéhu (adapted into a French television series in 1966) and Le Chevalier de Saint-Hermine. The last one was left unfinished and was only rediscovered in 1990; in 2005 it became a bestseller in France.
  • The Baron In The Trees, a surrealist novella by Italo Calvino, deals with the influence of The Enlightenment and the finale features the Italian campaign of the French Revolutionary Wars and Napoleon's retreat. Voltaire and Napoléon Bonaparte appear in the book.
  • Les Chouans by Honoré de Balzac, about royalist underground fighters in Brittany.
  • The Gods Are Athirst by Anatole France explores the Terror from the perspective of a Robespierre fanatic.
  • Les Misérables by Victor Hugo, though not actually set during the French Revolution, makes constant references to it (though the July Revolution was highly inspired by the Revolution as well). The revolutionary Enjolras is based on Louis Antoine de Saint-Just.
    • Ninety-Three, Victor Hugo's final novel, set during the Reign of Terror. Though it was actually inspired by Hugo's experiences during the Paris Commune in 1871.
  • The Pink Carnation series.
  • A Place of Greater Safety by Hilary Mantel chronicles the Revolutionary from the perspective of the early friendship between Camille Desmoulins, Georges Danton and Maximilien Robespierre.
  • The Red Lion (a significant part of it).
  • Scaramouche, subtitled "A Romance of the French Revolution", begins just before the calling of the States General and climaxes against the backdrop of the Storming of the Tuileries. The protagonist mostly tries to stay out of it, but still gets involved in several key events along the way and serves for a while as a delegate to the National Assembly, less because he has believes in the ideals of the reformers and more because he has beef against one corrupt aristocrat in particular.
  • The Scarlet Pimpernel
  • A Tale of Two Cities is probably the most famous depiction of the French Revolution in Anglosphere pop culture. It is, after all, a Charles Dickens novel and has naturally received numerous adaptations. Taking place before and during the Revolution, the story focuses on a group of fictional characters in both London and Paris, which are the two cities of the title. In particular, it centers on a Love Triangle, with French aristocrat Charles Darnay and English lawyer Sydney Carton vying for the affections of Lucie Manette, whose father was once imprisoned in the Bastille. Meanwhile, the vindictive revolutionary Madame Defarge wants Darnay to pay for his family's crimes.
  • La Vendée by Anthony Trollope, which predated A Tale of Two Cities by nine years and focused on the Vendean uprising.
  • The Way to the Lantern
  • Cuban author Alejo Carpentier wrote two classics about the impact of the French Revolution on Latin America.
    • The Kingdom of This World deals with the Haitian Revolution.
    • Explosion in a Cathedral note  deals with Victor Hugues, an obscure Revolutionary, who brought the Emancipation Decree of 1794 to the former slave-run sugar-owning colonies and started several Slave Liberation(s) in the Caribbean.
  • Heinrich von Kleist's novella The Betrothal in St. Domingo is set during the revolution in Haiti. His essay On the Gradual Production of Thoughts whilst Speaking uses Mirabeau's famous answer to the royal order to dissolve the Estates General as a prime example.
  • Stefan Zweig's series of historical miniatures Sternstunden der Menschheit includes the posthumously added story "Das Genie einer Nacht" ("The genius of a night") about the writing of the Marseillaise by Rouget de Lisle.
  • The earlier timeline in The Eight by Katherine Neville focuses mainly on original characters, but notably features Talleyrand, David, and the Bonaparte family.
  • The Runaway Queen, one of the short stories from The Bane Chronicles takes place in this period. The storie follows the warlock Magnus Bane who gets hired by Count Alex von Fersen to save queen Marie Antoinette.
  • Thunder of Valmy, by Geoffrey Trease (also known as "Victory at Valmy" in the US) is a YA novel detailing the events of the revolution as seen by Pierre, the book's portagonist. Pierre, youngest son of a peasant family, has been adopted by an old extravangant Lady painter, to nurture and develop his artistic talent. This also puts him in a previleged position to witness (and sometimes participate in) the events of the revolution, from the forming of the National Assembly up to the eponymous battle at Valmy.

Live-Action TV 

  • Blackadder the Third (for one episode)
  • Doctor Who: "The Reign of Terror"
  • The Time Tunnel episode "Reign of Terror".
  • Horatio Hornblower: Episode "The Wrong War" (aka "The Frogs and the Lobsters") deals with a civil war between the Royalists and the Revolutionaries.
  • Interview with the Vampire (2022): In "No Pain", the earlier Flashbacks are set in 1795 Paris, and it's mentioned in dialogue that Maximilien Robespierre was guillotined the year before.
  • Die Jagd nach dem Urmeter/Un mètre pour mesurer le monde (The hunt for the first meter/One meter to measure the world), a very well made German documentary about the difficult birth of the Metric system, especially the meter.
  • Napoléon is a four-parts miniseries covering the life of Napoléon Bonaparte. The first episode is mostly set during the Directory eranote  and the events depicted include the 13 Vendémiaire revolt, the Italy and Egypt campaigns, and the 1799 coup.
  • John Adams: The appropriate American response to the French Revolution is a significant point starting in "Unite or Die" and is a major issue of the title character's presidency starting in "Unnecessary War" (which includes the Citizen Genêt affair). On a personal level, the response to the French Revolution is the start of the rift between Adams and his old friend Thomas Jefferson — Jefferson is sympathetic with it, even during the Terror, while Adams is horrified by the Terror and pursues neutrality as President.

Podcasts 

  • Revolutions by Mike Duncan: The thirs season is a history of the French Revolution. It is engrossing and highly detailed for a non-academic history and the second-longest season of the podcast, clocking in at 54 approximately half-hour episodes, plus a few supplemental episodes, for what is about 27 hours of material on the subject. (It was surpassed by the tenth and final season on the Russian Revolutions, which comes in at a whopping 103 episodes, although that's slightly cheating since that season covers the 1905 Revolution and both 1917 Revolutions.) The French Revolution is also discussed in Season 4 when Duncan deals with the Haitian Revolution (Haiti starting out as a French colony with the vast majority of its population slaves) and the early episodes of Season 5 (about Simón Bolívar) naturally mention how events in Europe (mostly France and Spain) influenced Spanish America.

Music 

Tabletop Games 

  • Guillotine is a Wizards of the Coast card game in which each player portrays a rival executioner during the French Revolution and takes turns guillotining prisoners. Players compete by manipulating the line to claim the highest-value heads.

Theatre 

  • Danton's Death (play by Georg Büchner)
  • Marat/Sade by Peter Weiss
  • Andrea Chénier, an opera by Umberto Giordano based on the life and death of the poet André Chénier.
  • Dialogues of the Carmelites, an opera about the "Compiègne Martyrs", 16 nuns who were guillotined in 1794. Written by Francis Poulenc based on a screenplay by Georges Bernanos based on the novella The Last on the Scaffold by Gertrud von Le Fort.
  • The French Revolution, a French 1973 rock opera by Alain Boublil and Jean-Max Rivière.
  • Hamilton brings up the Revolution during "Cabinet Battle #2", where Jefferson and Hamilton discuss the worsening situation with Washington.

Video Games 

  • Assassin's Creed: Unity follows the course of the Revolution between 1789 and 1793 and several historical figures impact the plot.
  • Banner of the Maid is set in an alternate history version of the later stages of the Revolution, chronicling the early campaigns of Napoleon Bonaparte's sister Pauline against various enemies of France.
  • We. The Revolution puts the player in the skin of a Revolutionary Tribunal judge who does his duty both on mundane everyday cases for the common folk and on bigger affairs that had much attention during the era.

Web Comics 

Web Original 

Western Animation