Georges Lefebvre's book The Coming of the French Revolution brought with it an extremely good critique from his contemporaries. When it came out it was well received, "...Lefebvre's book is simply the best introduction to the study of the French Revolution available anywhere". Lefebvre obtained a doctoral degree, then began university teaching, and in 1935 he was made a professor at the Sorbonne. The Coming of the French Revolution which was written for the nonspecialist and is perhaps the best general picture of the ancien regime available in English. Lefebvre's exhaustive knowledge of the French peasantry of the 18th century was his sure guide in analyzing the society of the time, since four-fifths of the people were peasants and the social positions of the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie, and the town laboring classes were defined largely by their relation to the rural population . With the credentials that Lefebvre has earned it is easy to see that he is indeed informed and factual about what he is writing. His analysis in this book is well proven and interestingly written.

Lefebvre's book breaks the French Revolutio

The aristocracy was not the only peoples who had grievances with the French monarchy. The Bourgeoisie also had its problems. First we need to look at the third estate in French society. It was made up of everybody other than the nobles and clergy . The bourgeoisie were the lawyers, tax collectors and doctors. So besides the separation of the bourgeoisie from the rest of the third estate there was a different classes within the bourgeoisie. There were the Gerondins or upper class, the lower middle class, and the urban workers . They all made a potpourri of grievances and different levels of agitation. One thing they all had in common was they all paid an unfair tax. They wanted an equitable tax that did not just burden the third estate. They did accomplish breaking away from the old assembly and made their own National Assembly . This was a bold move for the third estate as a whole.

With the critical acclaim that Lefebvre won from scholars and critics alike it is easy to see that his methodology was good. When actually reading The Coming of the French Revolution the use of footnotes is not very prevalent. Lefebvre instead makes use of internal notation to explain where he obtained his information. He has gone over drafts of the early constitutions. The author also had poured over thousands upon thousands of minutes of early meetings of the Estates General. His research and writing style is impeccable and makes for an easy read. Lefebvre's overall layout of the book is great. He sets forth in his table of contents and breaks down the revolution in a very concise easy to follow manner. The flow of his book is exemplary in the way he takes the reader through each individual component of society. He shows how the classes differ and where they come together with each other. However he does not make any use of charts or maps. Maps in this book are not really necessary if you know the basic geography of France. This book being an introductory book to the French Revolution could maybe have benefited from at least one general map of France. One of the only downfalls of this book that can be argued is the use of charts. With the groupings of people in his book it could have been helpful to see a breakdown of peoples in each class.

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Approximate Word count = 1533
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)