Book description
How did the French Revolution become thinkable? Keith Michael Baker, a leading authority on the ideological origins of the French Revolution, explores this question in his wide-ranging collection of essays. Analyzing the new politics of contestation that transformed the traditional political culture of the Old Regime during its last decades,…
Why read it?
1 author picked Inventing the French Revolution as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
What makes a revolution thinkable? Looking back, we tend to think we can identify revolutions, pinpoint their causes, and analyze their outcomes.
In this classic account of the years leading up to the French Revolution, Baker traces how revolutionaries were able to imagine a revolution and how they invented the very concept as they went. Even as they were hell-bent on breaking the Old Regime, the French revolutionaries were shaped and limited by it; their thinking was ultimately bounded by the concepts and language available to them going in.
I love this book because it provides a stimulating history of…
From Katlyn's list on The most revolutionary books about revolutionary ideas.
If you love Inventing the French Revolution...
December on 5C4
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
Want books like Inventing the French Revolution?
Our community of 13,000+ authors has personally recommended 100 books like Inventing the French Revolution.
Share your top 3 reads of 2026!
And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.
181
readers submitted
so far, will you?
📚 If you like Inventing the French Revolution, you might also like...
Sexy Selfie Nation
The problem is not with the actions young women take but with the toxic, sexist conditions they are responding to.
Tanenbaum found, based on six years of interviews with young people ages 14-30, that young women are navigating a culture littered with gendered dress codes, revenge porn, and sexually explicit…
In This Together
In This Together explores how we can harness our social networks to make a real impact fighting the climate crisis. Against notions of the lone environmental crusader, Marianne E. Krasny shows us the power of "network climate action"—the idea that our own ordinary acts can influence and inspire those close…
