That Magical Word Liberty

Nicolas Ruault was a printer and publisher who lived and worked in Paris at the end of the eighteenth century. He is virtually unknown among historians and was intensely aware of, in his own words, his 'obscurity' and 'mediocrity'. This is far from the truth. Living through the age of the Enlightenment and the tumultuous period of the French Revolution, he rubbed shoulders with some of the leading figures of his age, including the Marquis de Condorcet, Caron de Beaumarchais, Benjamin Franklin, Louis-Sebastien Mercier, Maximilien Robespierre, and Georges Danton. Through 400 remarkable and lively letters from and to Nicolas and in correspondence with six family members and friends, including Condorcet, his life offers fresh insight into Paris before, during, and after the Revolution: his intellectual passions, especially for the works of the philosophes of the Enlightenment; his daily and nightly cultural activities; his eventual commitment to the radical politics of the Revolution; and even his love life.In so doing, the book reveals the complexity of the age as it was experienced by individuals. We discover Ruault's passionate commitments, his indecision, his vacillation, his 'non-linear evolution' as he confronted and often wavered before the extraordinary events of a revolution that he never anticipated, and as he - and contemporaries the world over - wrestled with the meaning of 'that magical word liberty'.