Siân Reynolds – författare

Marriage and Revolution is a double biography of Jean-Marie Roland (1734-1793) and Marie-Jeanne Phlipon, later Madame Roland (1754-1793), leading figures in the French Revolution. J.-M. Roland was minister of the Interior for a total of eight months during 1792. The couple were close to Brissot and the Girondins, and both died during the Terror. Mme Roland became famous for her posthumous prison memoirs and is the subject of many biographies, but her husband, despite being a key figure in administration of France, seldom out of the limelight during his time in office, is often marginalized in histories of the Revolution.Siân Reynolds examines the Roland marriage from its beginnings in an ancien régime mésalliance, opposed by both families, through its close cooperation in the 1780s, to its final phase as a political partnership during the Revolution. Both Roland's actions as minister and Mme Roland's role as a woman close to power were praised and blamed at the time, and the controversies have persisted. Based on manuscript sources including many unpublished letters, Marriage and Revolution sets out to examine an unusually companionate marriage over the long term: its intimacy, parenthood, everyday life in the provinces, friendships, academic cooperation, political enthusiasms and quarrels, and finally its dramatic ending during the Revolution.

The study of French culture has long ceased to be purely centred on literature. Undergraduate French courses now embrace all forms of cultural production and consumption, and students need to have a broad knowledge of everything from day-time TV and the latest detective novels to debates about national identity and immigration policies.This stimulating text is an introduction to the full range of contemporary French culture. Written by a group of leading academics both within and outside France, each chapter focuses on a topic from the French cultural scene today. Starting with an overview of resources for further information (both in print and online), the text discusses the varied forms of French cultural expression and looks critically at what 'Frenchness' itself means. The book also explores examples of cultural production ranging from sport, media and literature to theatre, cinema, festivals and music. An essential resource for students and scholars alike, this text provides detailed material and analysis, as well as a launch-pad for further study.

Sian Reynolds challenges the prevailing assumption that women had little influence or power in France during the interwar period. She combines extensive empirical research with revealing insights into France's political history and women's history.

Sian Reynolds challenges the prevailing assumption that women had little influence or power in France during the interwar period. She combines extensive empirical research with revealing insights into France's political history and women's history.

By the end of the nineteenth century, Paris was widely acknowledged as the cultural capital of the world, the home of avant-garde music and art, symbolist literature and bohemian culture. Edinburgh, by contrast, may still be thought of as a rather staid city of lawyers and Presbyterian ministers, academics and doctors. While its great days as a centre for the European Enlightenment may have been behind it, however, late Victorian Edinburgh was becoming the location for a new set of cultural institutions, with its own avant-garde, that corresponded with a renewed Scottish national consciousness. While Morningside was never going to be Montparnasse, the period known as the Belle Epoque was a time in both French and Scottish society when there were stirrings of non-conformity, which often clashed with a still powerful establishment. And in this respect, French bourgeois society could be as resistant to change as the suburbs of Edinburgh. With travel and communication becoming ever easier, a growing number of international contacts developed that allowed such new and radical cultural ideas to flourish. In a series of linked essays, based on research into contemporary archives, documents and publications in both countries, as well as on new developments in cultural research, this book explores an unexpected dimension of Scottish history, while also revealing the Scottish contribution to French history. In a broader sense, and particularly as regards gender, it considers what is meant by 'modern' or 'radical' in this period, without imposing any single model. In so doing, it seeks not to treat Paris-Edinburgh links in isolation, or to exaggerate them, but to use them to provide a fresh perspective on the internationalism of the Belle Epoque.

By the end of the nineteenth century, Paris was widely acknowledged as the cultural capital of the world, the home of avant-garde music and art, symbolist literature and bohemian culture. Edinburgh, by contrast, may still be thought of as a rather staid city of lawyers and Presbyterian ministers, academics and doctors. While its great days as a centre for the European Enlightenment may have been behind it, however, late Victorian Edinburgh was becoming the location for a new set of cultural institutions, with its own avant-garde, that corresponded with a renewed Scottish national consciousness. While Morningside was never going to be Montparnasse, the period known as the Belle Epoque was a time in both French and Scottish society when there were stirrings of non-conformity, which often clashed with a still powerful establishment. And in this respect, French bourgeois society could be as resistant to change as the suburbs of Edinburgh. With travel and communication becoming ever easier, a growing number of international contacts developed that allowed such new and radical cultural ideas to flourish. In a series of linked essays, based on research into contemporary archives, documents and publications in both countries, as well as on new developments in cultural research, this book explores an unexpected dimension of Scottish history, while also revealing the Scottish contribution to French history. In a broader sense, and particularly as regards gender, it considers what is meant by 'modern' or 'radical' in this period, without imposing any single model. In so doing, it seeks not to treat Paris-Edinburgh links in isolation, or to exaggerate them, but to use them to provide a fresh perspective on the internationalism of the Belle Epoque.

The New Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women is a fully revised and extended edition of a highly regarded reference work that illuminates the lives of Scottish women in history. It includes more than 180 additional entries on women who died before 2018, forty new photographs, and an extended thematic index. With fascinating lives on every page, the concise entries illustrate the lives of Scottish women from the distant past to our own times, as well as the worldwide Scottish diaspora. Written by experts, the book provides a striking narrative of how women’s actions and influence have always helped to shape Scotland’s identity.