The Recollections

What It's About

Written in 1850–51 during a period of enforced retirement from public life, these are Tocqueville's private recollections of the 1848 Revolution in France and its turbulent aftermath. He recounts the collapse of the July Monarchy, the chaos of revolutionary Paris, the founding of the Second Republic, and his own experience serving as Foreign Minister under Louis-Napoleon. Tocqueville never intended the manuscript for publication, and it remained unpublished until 1893 - and even then only in a truncated form, after his editors removed many of his sharpest and most critical opinions of the people involved.

Key Concepts

Unlike his more measured public writing, this is Tocqueville at his most unguarded - offering blunt, often unflattering character sketches of the political figures around him, including Louis-Napoleon and Lamartine. It captures his uneasy fascination with revolutionary upheaval, his class anxieties as an aristocrat navigating a democratic age, and his firsthand assessment of how quickly political order can unravel.

About the Author

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) was a French aristocrat, political thinker, and historian, descended from Norman nobility that had suffered during the French Revolution. He served as a magistrate, diplomat, and politician under the July Monarchy and the Second Republic, retiring from public life after Louis-Napoleon's coup of 1851.

About This Edition

This is an 1896 translation by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos.