REVIEW BY JONATHAN EATON
As Regius Professor of History at the University of Cambridge, Sir Christopher Clark has an established reputation for the crafting of insightful historical narratives that explore complex periods of change and turbulence across the European continent. Most notably, these include The Sleepwalkers, published in 2012, which tracks the factors that compelled the major European powers over the precipice into war in 1914, through an analysis of the political currents of the previous decade. His latest work, Revolutionary Spring: fighting for a new world 1848-1849, harnesses a similar approach in analysing historical events and political trends within individual nations as part of a broader European framework.
The subject of Clark’s study is the series of apparently interconnected revolutions that convulsed Europe in 1848. The chronology of these revolutionary events across a broad geographic area proves challenging to unravel, particularly as they are often intrinsically linked to political and intellectual trends within individual nations. Localised revolutionary activities cascaded across the broader European landmass, permeating national boundaries and imperial frontiers. In this sense, the events of 1848 differ markedly from more well-known revolutions, including those in France and Russia, which failed to trigger similar revolutionary initiatives in other nations. As Clark highlights, the impact of the revolutionary movements of 1848 was felt beyond the shores of Europe, stimulating radical intellectual thought in Australia, Latin America, and the French Caribbean, demonstrating the transmission of 19th-century political knowledge across the globe.
Clark recognises that the foundations of the 1848 revolutionary movements were laid by a range of interconnecting intellectual trends that congregated around an urgent demand for change, including the role of women in work, politics, and society; religious freedom; and emancipation of the oppressed. While the revolutionary movements that came to the fore in 1848 had a long intellectual gestation as republican sentiments against monarchical rule, the immediate catalyst for action was a localised insurrection in Sicily, which sought to reject Bourbon rule.
