Introduction: The Terrible Year (1870–1871)
Chapter 1: Ashes (1871)
Chapter 2: Recovery (1871)
Chapter 3: Scaling the Heights (1871–1872)
Chapter 4: The Moral Order (1873–1874)
Chapter 5: "This will kill that." (1875)
Chapter 6: Pressure Builds (1876–1877)
Chapter 7: A Splendid Diversion (1878)
Chapter 8: Victory (1879–1880)
Chapter 9: Saints and Sinners (1880)
Chapter 10: Shadows (1881–1882)
Chapter 11: A Golden Tortoise (1882)
Chapter 12: Digging Deep (1883)
Chapter 13: Hard Times (1884)
Chapter 14: That Genius, That Monster (1885)
Chapter 15: Onward and Upward (1886)
Chapter 16: Fat and Thin (1887–1888)
Chapter 17: Centennial (1889)
Chapter 18: Sacred and Profane (1890–1891)
Chapter 19: Family Affairs (1892)
Chapter 20: "The bell has tolled. . . ." (1893)
Chapter 21: Between Storms (1894)
Chapter 22: Dreyfus (1895)
Chapter 23: Passages (1896)
Chapter 24: A Shot in the Dark (1897)
Chapter 25: "J'accuse!" (1898)
Chapter 26: "Despite all these anxieties . . ." (1898)
Chapter 27: Rennes (1898–1899)
Chapter 28: A New Century (1900)
Bibliography
Mary McAuliffe received a Ph.D. in history from the University of Maryland and has taught at several universities and lectured at the Smithsonian Institution. For many years she was a regular contributor to Paris Notes. She has traveled extensively in France and is the author of Paris Discovered: Explorations in the City of Light. She lives in New York City with her husband. Click here to visit her photo blog on Facebook for insights on French history and culture.
[In her] splendid . . . work, Dawn of the Belle Epoque, Mary
McAuliffe strikingly evoked the three flourishing decades of
culture that followed France’s humiliation by Germany and the
never-to-be-forgotten crowning, in 1871, of a German emperor at
Versailles.
*The New York Times*
Rising from the ashes of the Franco-Prussian War and the Commune,
the tumultuous Third Republic's early years from 1870 to 1900,
known as the Belle Epoque, was an era in which groundbreaking
artists flourished: Monet, Eiffel, Rodin, Debussy, and other
one-name legends. McAuliffe chronicles the story of Paris's
rebirth, capturing the artistic freedom of impressionism in
painting and music, and new ideas in sculpture and on the stage
even as Republican secularists, lingering Communards, and the
royalist Catholic hierarchy fought for political and popular
control, a struggle wonderfully illustrated through the
construction in this era of the Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel
Tower, and the Basilique du Sacré Coeur. [McAuliffe offers]
fascinating glimpses into the lives of each significant figure . .
. including Sarah Bernhardt's, whose self-marketing could well have
served as a blueprint for Lady Gaga. The author doesn't overlook
the Dreyfus affair and economic hard times, but the relationships
and creative output of the era's innovators create a marvelous
vision of Paris at its heady, uncertain best.
*Publishers Weekly*
In Dawn of the Belle Epoque, Mary McAuliffe—who earned a Ph.D. from
the University of Maryland and wrote for Paris Notes—tells the
intriguing story of how Paris came alive again after that black
period of French history. . . . To tell this incredibly complicated
story, Ms. McAuliffe uses an interesting technique, one that might
be identified more with fiction than nonfiction. Arranged
chronologically into 28 chapters year by year from 1871 to 1900,
the book consists of short scene-like vignettes featuring key
historical figures and their actions during the year in question.
Thus Dawn of the Belle Epoque reads more like a novel than an
academic history. . . . Rich with the flavor of words taken from
primary sources, the book provides an intimate look at the very
human side of history. An extensive bibliography including French
sources and 24 pages of endnotes allow for much further reading
investigation. . . . Today's Paris rose from war and ashes, as Mary
McAuliffe's Dawn of the Belle Epoque so eloquently proves.
*New York Journal of Books*
Today, Paris retains its allure as a mecca for lovers of art,
fashion, and high culture. To an extent, that allure is a legacy of
the Belle Epoque, an age from roughly the end of the
Franco-Prussian War in 1871 to the onset of WWI in 1914. McAuliffe
examines the earliest phase of the period, up to the turn of the
century. As the term indicates, this was an era of wonderful
cultural flowering. In literature, giants like Zola and Hugo were
active. The list of painters and sculptors who emerged seems
endless, including Toulouse-Lautrec, Manet, Monet, and Rodin.
McAuliffe tracks, on a year-by-year basis, this explosion of
artistic expression. She does not ignore the seamy underside of
this glittering picture. She pays ample attention to the political
turmoil, beginning with the horrors of the Paris Commune and ending
with the disgrace of the Dreyfus Affair, which virtually dominated
French political discourse for years. This is an excellent and
honest portrayal of an exciting and vital era in European
history.
*Booklist*
It is within this psychologically damaged milieu that McAuliffe
deftly explores the inner lives of the artists and those who
surrounded them, and in the process humanizes these
larger-than-life characters. . . . McAuliffe has added a truly
remarkable degree of insight into both the lives of the
participants and the turbulent world they inhabited. McAuliffe
paints with broad, majestic strokes a world that has been lost to
us or perhaps never was.
*Washington Independent Review of Books*
What a story [Mary McAuliffe] has to tell! In a world of
breathtaking achievement in art, music, drama, dance, sculpture,
literature, and occasionally even politics, the 'to-ings and
fro-ings' of those synonymous with the period—Zola, Bernhardt,
Clemenceau, Eiffel, Debussy, Rodin—are set against the perpetual
high drama that was the Third Republic. This gossipy soufflé . . .
will entertain those who love the arts, French history, or Paris. .
. . A fun read for all. Highly recommended.
*CHOICE*
Unique and insightful. . . . In each chapter we are introduced to
the key personalities and events of the era, often through excerpts
from letters or diaries. I felt like I was a part of the personal
lives of everyone, and by the time I finished the book I had a
deeper understanding of the (real life) characters, even those I
already knew a lot about. Mary brilliantly juxtaposes the
groundbreaking works in painting, sculpture, literature, poetry,
architecture, and music with the collapse of the Second Empire, the
Paris Commune, the Panama Canal scandal, turbulent clashes between
the Republic and the Church, economic woes, nasty anti-Semitism,
and the Dreyfus Affair. The struggles and events of these years
have continued to influence French politics and society right up to
the present day.
*The Collected Traveller*
Mary McAuliffe’s book is a charming and detailed meander through
the lives of the writers and artists who lived and worked in Paris
between 1871 and 1900. Each chapter describes a year in the life of
the French capital, during which the author depicts the major
Parisian events and provides a fascinating variety of anecdotes,
little-known facts, and background detail that any connoisseur of
the city will relish. . . . The result is an informative and
evocative guide to late nineteenth-century Paris that would be an
ideal accompaniment to a stay in the capital. . . . A most
entertaining and readable account of a fascinating era and will be
useful to both students of Paris and visitors alike.
*French Studies*
This book explores the private and public lives of well-known
artists, composers, architects, poets, novelists, sculptors,
playwrights, actresses, dancers, entrepreneurs, and politicians in
the last third of the nineteenth century. McAuliffe’s deep research
in both primary and secondary sources, combined with her skilled
reconstruction of social and professional networks, results in a
wealth of fascinating, roughly interwoven biographies and
historical events. . . . [I]t is an evocative and pleasurable
read.
*French History*
McAuliffe should be strongly commended for corralling such an
immense amount of data into a tightly paced, informative, and
highly readable compendium. The book is sure to delight readers as
much as it informs them and it should be of interest to anyone
teaching or taking courses on the history of Paris.
*Contemporary French Civilization*
Mary McAuliffe takes us on an engaging tour of Paris at a turbulent
moment in its history. From the disastrous Franco-Prussian War to
the hopeful turn of the twentieth century, year by year she
chronicles in wonderful detail the highs and lows faced by the
city’s high-powered political leaders and its creative men and
women. Along the way, her beautiful storytelling reveals the
triumphs, challenges, and scandals of an age that brought one
century to an end and launched another. Anyone who loves Paris will
enjoy this delightful book.
*Jeffrey H. Jackson, author of Paris Under Water: How the City of
Light Survived the Great Flood of 1910*
Composers, scientists, engineers, architects, politicians,
painters, sculptors, novelists, poets, hoteliers, restauranteurs,
journalists, actors, dancers, courtesans, merchants, patrons. . . .
Somehow, someway, Mary McAuliffe, in Dawn of the Belle Epoque,
manages to unwrap the essences of all of their lives and to uncover
their almost unbelievable interconnectivity during an astonishing
inflection point in Paris—indeed, world—history. Out of hundreds,
this is simply the most enjoyable Paris book I have ever read.
*Mark Eversman, editor, Paris Notes*
The Federation of Alliances Françaises is pleased to suggest Mary
McAuliffe's wonderful new book. Once again this historic period
comes to life as the Paris of 1871 recovers to greet the 'full
flower' of the Belle Epoque. A great read for your book clubs.
*Mimi Gregory, president, the Federation of Alliances
Françaises*
I love Dawn of the Belle Epoque. It gave me a whole new layer of
Paris to appreciate, and I truly savored every insight.
*Jane Robert, president, Renaissance Française - USA*
Ask a Question About this Product More... |