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Abstract
This article examines the many rewritings of a single story: the adventures of a brigand vigilante, first told in Schiller's Die Raüber, adapted by Lamartelière into the 1792 hit Robert, chef de brigands, and updated over the next decade through new endings and sequels. The evolving nature of this vigilante – from noble brigand to popular insurrectionist to merciful judge to Terrorist – reflects the anxieties produced by the shift from a conception of justice as a transcendental force, originating in God's will and flowing through the king and his courts, to an immanent model resting on the notion that all humans possess an innate sense of right and wrong and thus the ability to judge. The manifold revisions of Schiller's story open a window onto the shifting sands of Revolutionary justice, revealing the impact of such events as the September Massacres, Louis XVI's trial, and the institution of the Revolutionary Tribunal.
Biographical note
Yann Robert is Associate Professor in the Department of French and Francophone Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His book, Dramatic Justice: Trial by Theater in the Age of the French Revolution, was published by the University of Pennsylvania Press in 2018. That same year, he was awarded UIC's Rising Star Award in the Humanities, Arts, Design and Architecture. His research has received support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, notably through a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University and a one-year research fellowship at the Newberry Library, as well as from the Jacob K. Javits and the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundations.
Notes
1 On this transition and its judicial, aesthetic, and political impact during the Enlightenment and Revolution, see Yann Robert, Dramatic Justice: Trial by Theater in the Age of the French Revolution (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019).
2 I thus share Pierre Frantz's view (albeit with a different focus) that studying Die Raüber and its impact in France opens a particularly revealing window on ‘le lien étroit de l’histoire du théâtre et de cette histoire qu’on peut appeler “histoire des idées ou des idéologies.”’ Pierre Frantz, ‘Le Crime devant le tribunal du théâtre: Les Brigands de Schiller et leur fortune sur la scène française,’ Littératures classiques, 67.3 (2008), 219.
3 Philippe Bourdin, ‘Le Brigand caché derrière les tréteaux de la révolution. Traductions et trahisons d’auteurs,’ Annales historiques de la Révolution française, 364 (2011), 60.
4 Although written years before the Revolution, the play was updated to reflect current events before its premiere in 1792. Edmond Eggli and several scholars after him have theorized that Beaumarchais lent not only his support but also his quill to the effort to modernize and politicize the play. Edmond Eggli, Schiller et le romantisme français, vol. 1 (Paris: J. Gamber, 1927), pp. 96–97.
5 Max Rouché, ‘Nature de la liberté, légitimité de l'insurrection dans Les Brigands et Guillaume Tell,’ Études germaniques, 14 (October–December 1959), 403–04; François Labbé, Jean-Henri-Ferdinand Lamartelière (1761–1830): un dramaturge sous la Révolution, l’Empire et la Restauration ou l’élaboration d’une référence schillérienne en France (Berne: Peter Lang, 1990), p. 54; Bourdin, 54.
6 Dominique Peyrache, ‘Le Sublime et le crime: Autour des Brigands de Schiller,’ Revue de Littérature Comparée, 65 (1991), 277; Benoît Garnot, Être brigand: Du Moyen Âge à nos jours (Paris: Armand Colin, 2013), p. 34.
7 Friedrich Schiller, The Robbers and Wallenstein, trans. by F.J. Lamport (London: Penguin Classics, 1979), p. 159.
8 Schiller, p. 159.
9 Jean-Henri-Ferdinand Lamartelière, Robert, chef de brigands (Paris: Barba, 1802), p. 46.
10 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 17.
11 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 38.
12 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 57.
13 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 58.
14 Schiller, p. 160.
15 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 57.
16 Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, 11–12 March 1792.
17 Timothy Tackett, ‘La Grande Peur et le complot aristocratique sous la Révolution française,’ Annales historiques de la Révolution française, 335 (2004), 1–17.
18 Garnot, pp. 134–40.
19 François Charbonneau, ‘Institutionnaliser le droit à l’insurrection. L’article 35 de la constitution montagnarde de 1793,’ Tangence, 106 (2014), 95.
20 Ami du peuple, 10 November 1789.
21 Lamartelière admits as much in the preface to his play: ‘On m’a reproché d’avoir mis des brigands sur la scène. Eh! Qu’importe le nom, quand la chose n’y est pas?’
22 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 38.
23 Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, 11–12 March 1792; Journal général de France, 28 March 1792.
24 Bourdin, 66.
25 Chronique de Paris, 13 March 1792.
26 Révolutions de Paris, 14–21 April 1792.
27 Journal de la cour et de la ville, 22 March 1792; Journal général de France, 28 March 1792; Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, 11–12 March 1792; Journal des théâtres, 16 March 1792; Moniteur universel, 27 March 1792.
28 Révolutions de Paris, 14–21 April 1792.
29 Chronique de Paris, 13 March 1792; Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, 11–12 March 1792.
30 Lamartelière was not the first to invent a happy ending. Already in Germany, the most frequently performed version of Schiller's play was D.H. Thomas's adaptation, in which Karl marries Amalia, his father survives, and his brigands become virtuous (Labbé, p. 51).
31 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 53.
32 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 20. See also p. 13 and p. 19.
33 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 60.
34 Révolutions de Paris, 14–21 April 1792.
35 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 64.
36 Révolutions de Paris, 14–21 April 1792.
37 George Sand, Histoire de ma vie, in Œuvres complètes de George Sand, vol. 1 (Paris: Lévy, 1892), p. 191 and 196; Eggli, p. 102 and 104.
38 Eggli, p. 132.
39 Jean-Henri-Ferdinand Lamartelière, Le Tribunal redoutable, ou la suite de Robert, chef de brigands (Paris: Barba, 1793), p. 107.
40 Lamartelière, Tribunal, p. 10.
41 Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, 10 November 1792.
42 Several newspapers compare Robert to the massacres in Avignon: Journal des théâtres, 16 March 1792; Journal de la cour et de la ville, 22 March 1792; Journal général de France, 28 March 1792.
43 Labbé, p. 26.
44 Lamartelière, Robert, p. 17.
45 Lamartelière, Tribunal, p. 97.
46 Lamartelière, Tribunal, pp. 16–17, p. 42, p. 91, p. 98, p. 102.
47 Robert, Dramatic Justice, p. 223, pp. 239–241.
48 Robespierre protested that the Massacres were a genuinely popular insurrection. Éric Hazan, Une Histoire de la Révolution française (Paris: Éditions La Fabrique, 2012), pp. 167–68.
49 When he becomes a sovereign and a judge, Robert ceases to be a vigilante, since by definition vigilantism cannot be recognized or authorized by the state. Les Johnston, ‘What is Vigilantism?,’ The British Journal of Criminology, 36.2 (1996), 225.
50 Lamartelière, Tribunal, p. 81. On pages 84–85, Wolbac distinguishes between a kidnapper-rapist, who is a ‘scélérat’, and a wealthy or high-born individual guilty of the same crimes, who is an ‘oppresseur’ and deserves to be tried and executed by the tribunal.
51 On 25 December 1792, the Moniteur universel notes the significance of the tribunal suspending briefly ‘cette justice un peu trop expéditive’.
52 Lamartelière, Tribunal, p. 82.
53 Lamartelière, Tribunal, p. 104.
54 Hazan, pp. 154–55; Jean-Clément Martin, Nouvelle histoire de la Révolution française (Paris: Perrin, 2012), p. 328.
55 Révolutions de Paris, 17–24 November 1792.
56 There were two ‘reports’ on the 6 and 7 November, but the debates at the Convention opened on the 13.
57 François Robert, ‘Opinion de François Robert,’ Le Pour et le contre: Recueil complet des opinions prononcées à l’Assemblée Conventionnelle dans le procès de Louis XVI, vol. 1 (Paris: Buisson, 1792–93), p. 221.
58 Maximilien Robespierre, ‘Opinion sur le jugement de Louis XVI,’ Pour et le contre, vol. 3, pp. 387–88.
59 Révolutions de Paris, 17–24 November 1792. The same article also praises Gonchon for having spoken ‘en homme du 10 août’.
60 Labbé, p. 124.
61 Journal encyclopédique, 10 December 1792; Révolutions de Paris, 17–24 November 1792.
62 Lamartelière, Tribunal, p. 106.
63 Robert, Dramatic Justice, pp. 229–31; Aurore Chéry, ‘“Je ne veux pas les attendrir”: La Question de la sensibilité niée et ses conséquences dans le procès et l’exécution de Louis XVI,’ in La Culture Judiciaire: Discours, représentations et usages de la justice du Moyen Âge à nos jours (Dijon: Presses Universitaires de Dijon, 2014).
64 Journal encyclopédique, 10 December 1792.
65 Moniteur universel, 25 December 1792; Bulletin national, 6 December 1792; Révolutions de Paris, 8–15 December 1792.
66 Interestingly, one copy of the play offers clues to what a Republican version might have looked like, and how difficult it would have been to achieve. On it, an unknown hand has crossed out terms such as ‘souverain’ and ‘sujets’, even tearing off the page where Adolphe recovers his crown. The copy is part of the Warwick Digital Collections and can be found at https://cdm21047.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/Revolution/id/14263. For a history of this collection, see Kate Astbury and Clare Siviter, ‘La Collection de pièces de théâtre d’Amédée Marandet à la bibliothèque de l’Université de Warwick,’ in Collectionner la Révolution française, ed. by Gilles Bertrand, Michel Biard, Alain Chevalier, Martial Poirson and Pierre Serna (Paris: Société des études robespierristes, 2016).
67 Archives parlementaires de 1787 à 1860, vol. 60 (Paris: P. Dupont, 1901), p. 63.
68 Archives parlementaires, p. 63.
69 Primarily active in Westphalia during the Middle Ages, the Vehmic courts were a secret organization of lay judges (‘francs-juges’ in French) who accused, tried, and executed wrongdoers.
70 Moniteur universel, 6 germinal year 10.
71 Jean-Henri-Ferdinand Lamartelière, Les Trois Gil Blas, vol. 3 (Paris: Chaignieau ainé, 1802), pp. 19–20.
72 Jean-Henri-Ferdinand Lamartelière, Les Francs-Juges, ou le temps de barbarie (Paris: Barba, 1807), p. 2.
73 Sand, p. 203.