From 1770 to 1789 a succession of highly publicized cases riveted the attention of the French public. Maza argues that the reporting of these private scandals had a decisive effect on the way in which the French public came to understand public issues in the years before the Revolution.

Sarah Maza is Professor of History at Northwestern University and the author of Servants and Masters in Eighteenth-Century France: The Uses of Loyalty (1983).

"Maza is thorough and convincing. The most fascinating part of this brilliantly argued book concerns the whole idea of how public opinion is first formed in a country that is politically mature but lacking effective means of mass communication."—Sebastain Faulks, Literary Review

"A sophisticated analysis of the development of prerevolutionary political culture based on an examination of nontraditional sources. . . . This is an important work for revolutionary historians."—Choice

“A pleasure to read . . . . Like the eighteenth-century barristers who penned the best-selling briefs, [Maza] finds ways both to entertain her audience and to start readers thinking in broad terms.”—American Historical Review“

Co-winner of the David Pinckney Prize, Society for French Historical Studies