Tomasz Wysłobocki

Back to the future: to wake up in the middle of the French Revolution

Carbon de Flins des Oliviers writes ‘Le réveil d’Épiménide à Paris’ at the beginning of 1790, in the spirit of general enthusiasm for the French Revolution. The play is a big success, with 26 representations over a year. But surprisingly for a contemporary reader, its author has some bitter observations on the recent events and tries to show to the public, among other things, the dangers of boundless freedom of speech proclaimed by the ‘Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen’. He exhorts the French, as they remain active and vigorous actors on the revolutionary stage, to contemplate actively the political changes, for they can always distinguish lie form truth and for nobody can manip ulates them. 

Przyjęta w 1789 r. Deklaracja praw człowieka i obywatela czyniła Francuzów wolnych i równych wobec prawa. Szybko jednak okazało się, że połowie narodu odmówiono praw obywatelskich, powołując się na dobro wspólne i nakazy natury. Przedmiotem artykułu jest przemowa Jeana Pierre’a André Amara na forum Konwentu Narodowego w imieniu Komitetu Bezpieczeństwa Publicznego jesienią 1793 r. Raport Amara stał się później podstawą definitywnego wykluczenia kobiet z ciała suwerena i usunięcia ich ze sfery politycznej Republiki Francuskiej.

The French Revolution and the Problem of Civil Rights for Women: Why Did they Have to Stay at Home?

Abstract

The Declaration of the Rights of the Man and of the Citizen of 1789 made all  French citizens free and equal in the eyes of the law. However, it soon came to light that one half of the nation was deprived of civil rights in the name of the common good and so- called nature’s will. This article focuses on the speech of Jean Pierre André Amar who, in the autumn of 1793, presented on behalf of the revolutionary Committee of Public Safety a report which would soon become the basis for the definitive exclusion of women from the sovereign body and their dismissal from the political sphere.