Allen Ginsberg on the French Revolution (continued from yesterday)
AG: So then on July 8th, nine days later, after the mercenaries had surrounded Paris and Versailles at the order of the king, the commons voted to tell the king to get rid of the soldiers – to send them back where they belong. A motion by (Comte de) Mirabeau, the revolutionary. Abbé Sieyès, who was one of the revolutionary leaders who in Blake is the figure who’s representative of the people in this poem, pointed out that in Brittany troops weren’t permitted nearer than ten leagues to the meeting of the estates (provincial] there (or) the councils. In other words, common law had it in Brittany that no troops were allowed near the meeting house. Louis replied that they were there to keep order and if the estates didn’t like it they could move themselves rather than trying to move the army away. This is all just like today. This kind of bickering between power and change. And (the King) refused to compromise on it and he ordered Necker into exile, a finance minister who had become (the) symbol of popular will, according to Erdman.
On the 13th of July, the Paris bourgeois threw up barricades and decided to establish a National Guard. The demand for the removal of the army was reiterated on the 13th, 14th, and 15th, and then Louis gave in, apparently. At the same time the Paris Committee named Lafayette colonel general of the bourgeois militia; that is to say the people’s middle class militia against the army. The King came to Paris to confirm the nomination and Lafayette put the king’s collar (white) between the red and blue of Paris to form the tri-color of the new order. And the unemployed were put to work demolishing the walls of the Bastille and the National Assembly began taking apart the legal structure of the old regime.
So this first book (of Blake’s poem “The French Revolution”) begins with the council of state of June 19th-21st, and ends with the removal of troops. But considerable liberties are taken with sequence and relationship of events. The fall of the Bastille is not described here but was saved probably for Book II. Blake disregards a lot of technical details, like the difference between the militia and the Royal Army (with) Lafayette (portrayed as the) commanding general of the whole nation. It’s sort of mythological. Lafayette was in charge of some of the troops, but he sort of mythologized it so that all troops were under Lafayette and it’s Lafayette’s decision that decides which way the army goes. So a simplification is what Blake has done – Yes?
Student: Was it actually a literal falling of the towers in the Bastille, or is that….
AG: I wondered about that myself.
Student: I thought maybe that might have been a (metaphorical) reference to revolution.
AG: Probably, yes. I don’t know whether they were.. I thought of it and I didn’t have a chance to check that out.