Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

Mayer (history, Princeton Univ.) uses a vast array of secondary sources to analyze the role of violence and terror in the French Revolution of 1789 and the Russian Revolution of 1917. This topic covers relatively new ground for Mayer, but one can detect influences from his earlier Dynamics of Counterrevolution in Europe 1875-1956 (LJ 7/71). Like most left-of-center historians, Mayer stresses that it was violent resistance to profound societal change that gave birth to the fear-inspired whirlwind of enraged vengeance that consumed both revolutions and has left us arguing about their legacies. Mayer's absorbing recapitulation of these ultimately tragic events leaves the reader with the desire to read more about the French and Russian Revolutions--the best compliment any historical work can receive. The Furies is a needed corrective to currently ascendant Burkean critiques of the French and Russian revolutions (e.g., Richard Pipes's Russian Revolution, LJ 11/1/90, and Robert Conquest's Reflections on a Ravaged Century, LJ 10/15/99). Recommended for academic and public libraries.--Jim Doyle, Sara Hightower Regional Lib. Rome, GA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

CHOICE Review

Mayer (Princeton, emer.) has long engaged the history community with dense, contentious, and important books. The Furies continues this tradition, asking very important questions about the origins and nature of violence in the French and Russian revolutions. Part 1 of the book is an extended debate with the vast secondary literature over the components of revolutionary violence. Mayer insists that there can be no revolution without "violence and terror; without civil and foreign war; without iconoclasm and religious conflict; without collision between country and city." Succeeding sections examine these components of the revolutionary experience in France and Russia. Mayer suggests that revolutionary terror is the product of neither individuals nor ideologies; rather, it is a primal force that once unleashed takes control of both actors and events. He insists that counterrevolutionaries play a crucial role in creating this climate. The Furies is polemical: the dust jacket quotes one reviewer praising its refutation of "misleading conservative interpretations." Although this conservative reviewer finds much to argue with in The Furies, he recommends it for all academic library collections. Mayer's contentions provide the grist for important comparative and thematic arguments: let the debate begin. G. P. Cox; Gordon College

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Arno J. Mayer is Professor of History Emeritus at Princeton University. He is best known for his last two books: The Persistence of the Old Regime and Why Did the Heavens Not Darken?: The "Final Solution" in History. He is also the author of Political Origins of the New Diplomacy and Politics and Diplomacy of Peacemaking.