Between 1793 and 1794, thousands of French citizens were imprisoned and  hundreds sent to the guillotine by a powerful dictatorship that claimed  to be acting in the public interest. Only a few years earlier,  revolutionaries had proclaimed a new era of tolerance, equal justice,  and human rights. How and why did the French Revolution's lofty ideals  of liberty, equality, and fraternity descend into violence and terror?
"By  attending to the role of emotions in propelling the Terror, Tackett  steers a more nuanced course than many previous historians have  managed...Imagined terrors, as...Tackett very usefully reminds us, can have  even more political potency than real ones."
-David A. Bell, The Atlantic
"[Tackett] analyzes the mentalite  of those who became 'terrorists' in 18th-century France...In emphasizing  weakness and uncertainty instead of fanatical strength as the driving  force behind the Terror, ...Tackett...contributes to an important  realignment in the study of French history.
-Ruth Scurr, The Spectator
"[A]  boldly conceived and important book...This is a thought-provoking book  that makes a major contribution to our understanding of terror and  political intolerance, and also to the history of emotions more  generally. It helps expose the complexity of a revolution that cannot be  adequately understood in terms of principles alone."
-Alan Forrest, Times Literary Supplement


