The Place de la Bastille

Epicentre of the Revolution of 1789, erstwhile bastion of the skilled working-class and centre of radical agitation, along with Pigalle and Montmartre a focus for popular and raffish night-life in the early twentieth century, the Bastille area of Eastern Paris (also known as the Faubourg Saint-Antoine) is now an ethnically and socially mixed quartier which still bears the traces of its previous avatars. In a fascinating tour, Keith Reader charts the history and cultural geography of this unique area of Paris, from the fortress and prison that gave the area its name to the building of the largest and costliest opera house in the world.

Epicentre of the Revolution of 1789, the Bastille area of Eastern Paris is an ethnically and socially mixed quartier. This title charts the history and cultural geography of this area of Paris, from the fortress and prison that gave the area its name to the building of the largest and costliest opera house in the world.

Acknowledgements Introduction: The Place de la Bastille 1. What's that poor creature doing here? : the area and the fortress before the Revolution of 1789 2. 'Thought blew the Bastille apart': the fall of teh fortress and the revolutionary years, 1789- 1815 3. 'The strategy of the generals of Africa shattered': the Restoration, Orleanist and Second Republic Years, 1815-1851 4. 'Where is the noise of the storm that I love?: The Second Empire from Hausmann to the Commune 5. 'Satan's bagpipes' : La Belle Epoque's forty-three years of peace 6. 'Villains, stars and everybody in between': The First War and the 'entre-deux-guerres' 7. 'Slicked hair and splendid sideburns': Occupation and Liberation 8. Let's have some sun!: post- Gaullisma and the Mitterrand years 9. 'A building, not a monument': the construction of the Bastille Opera 10.'A real earthquake': the impact of the Opera on the quartier 11. Flanerie in the archive: the Faubourg/ Bastille today Notes Bibliography Index