The Bastille as a transnational symbol of despotism: translations and editions of Remarques historiques et anecdotes sur le château de la Bastille (1774–98)

Abstract

ABSTRACT The fall of the Bastille on 14 July 1789 remains the single most emblematic episode in the history of the French Revolution. The infamous fortress had already functioned as an important political symbol well before 1789, however. From the beginning of the eighteenth century, a ‘black legend’ was constructed around the building, propelled by the publication of a succession of (real or fictitious) memoirs by ex-prisoners. The growth of the Bastille myth was favoured by political circumstances (dissatisfaction with absolutism) and a cultural climate (sensibility towards fear and imprisonment; Enlightenment calls for humanity, transparency and reason). No Bastille memoir became more influential than Joseph Marie Brossays du Perray’s Remarques historiques et anecdotes sur le château de la Bastille (1774). Besides being a hit in France, the pamphlet had a huge international career. Its English and German translations contributed to turning the Bastille into a transnational symbol of despotism. The meanings and interpretations of that symbol shifted both in France and abroad on the rhythm of historical events. The various French editions and English translations of Remarques historiques allow us to follow that process closely. Three temporalities in the pamphlet’s history can be distinguished which mark the Bastille’s construction as a political symbol in France and in Britain in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. The British reception of the Bastille, which revolved around the idealized British Constitution, shows that transnational exchanges can nevertheless be conducive to the reinforcement of national frames of reference.