Dancing to the Precipice
Lucie de la Tour du Pin and the French Revolution
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Vintage Publishing
Published:4th Mar '10
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
Lucie de la Tour du Pin was the Pepys of her generation: her diaries provide a vivid picture of Versailles, the French Revolution and Napoleon. This richly textured, highly enjoyable and evocative biography shows us an extraordinary woman in the midst of her extraordinary times.
Caroline Moorehead's richly novelistic biography sets Lucy and her dairies in their wider context, illuminating a remarkable period of history.
Dancing to the Precipice was shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award 2009.
Lucie de la Tour du Pin was the Pepys of her generation. She witnessed, participated in, and wrote diaries detailing one of the most tumultuous periods of history. From life in the Court of Versailles, through the French Revolution to Napoleon's rule, Lucie survived extraordinary times with great spirit. She recorded people, politics and intrigue, alongside the intriguing minutia of everyday life: food, work, illness, children, manners and clothes.
Caroline Moorehead's richly novelistic biography sets Lucy and her dairies in their wider context, illuminating a remarkable period of history.
Dancing to the Precipice was shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award 2009.
Utterly captivating... brings to life both Lucie and the glorious and terrible years through which she lived with a novelistic vividness, full of sights and sounds and flavours * Sunday Times *
A scintillating biography...Moorehead succeeds triumphantly [and] brings an assured grip on contemporary politics and a colourful sense of place * Daily Telegraph *
A rich and satisfying book which not only adds to our appreciation of Madame de la Tour du Pin's story but brings the whole tumultuous period and its characters to life * Spectator *
Lucie de la Tour de Pin has found a biographer worthy of her own storytelling skills. With a light-handed touch, Moorehead sets Lucie's story in its wider social and historical context, sketching the complicated political twists and turns in a way that makes them memorable without ever dumbing down -- Kathryn Hughes * Mail on Sunday *
Never less than a gripping story of an extraordinary life * Literary Review *
ISBN: 9780099490524
Dimensions: 216mm x 135mm x 38mm
Weight: 541g
528 pages