Читаем Россия во французской прессе периода Революции и Наполеоновских войн (1789-1814) полностью

Россия во французской прессе периода Революции и Наполеоновских войн (1789-1814)

Андрей Александрович Митрофанов , Евгения Александровна Прусская , Николай Владимирович Промыслов

The book is dedicated to the analysis of the changing image of Russia in the French press during the Revolution and the Napoleonic wars. The period of 1789-1814 was characterized by a complicated and unstable relationship between Russia and France. The authors focus on the mechanisms of the press functioning and the politics of the state towards it and analyze how publications in central and regional newspapers influenced on the public opinion about the Russian Empire and about certain aspects of its life. In addition to the press materials, the authors used in the research archival documents and other written evidence of the epoch.

In the first chapter the policy of the state towards the press in 1789— 1814, technological aspects of newspapers publishing, sources of the international news and particularity news about Russia are analyzed. The second chapter is dedicated to the discourse about the “Russian threat”, which emerged in the French public opinion in the 18th century. It was actively used by the newspapers in the period of cold relationship with Russia and was almost absent in the period of the French-Russian alliance. In the third chapter the depiction of the Russian army on the pages of the newspapers is analyzed. In the peaceful period between the countries French newspapers wrote about the success of the Russian army in the wars against her opponents, but in the period of bad relationship or in the period of Russian-French wars Russian army was depicted in a negative sense and Russian soldiers were represented as barbarians. The forth chapter is dedicated to the analysis of the description of Russian climate and weather in their connection to the French military propaganda. In the fifth chapter the image of the Russian imperial court and Russian emperors on the pages of the newspapers are analyzed. The figures of the monarchs were described controversially, depending on the phase of the relationship between the states.

The image of Russia on the pages of the French press in the period 1789-1814 was formed in the conditions of military and political upheavals. Peaceful periods in French-Russian relations were short-lived and changed by war. Archetypical stereotypes about culture, religion, customs, climate and state institutions of Russia, inherited from the 16th - 17th centuries, developed under the influence of the ideas of the Enlightenment and the republican ideology of the revolutionary France.

At the turn of the 19th century the French society came into direct contact with Russian reality. The Napoleonic military bureaucracy, which put the French press in the service of imperial diplomacy and military strategy, formed images of all countries that turned out to be military opponents of France using similar templates. However, the Russian Empire in the French press of the epoch served as a classic example of a “different” society and “other” culture. Description of Russia in the newspapers and its image influenced on the public opinion in France, predetermining the ways and phases of French-Russian relations for many decades.