Burton, Richard D.E. 1946–

PERSONAL:

Born 1946, in Newbury, England.

CAREER:

Literary critic, literary historian, educator, and author. University of Sussex, Sussex, England, professor of French and Francophone literature, retired.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year, 2002, for Blood in the City: Violence and Revelation in Paris, 1789-1945.

WRITINGS:

Assimilation or Independence? Prospects for Martinique, Centre for Developing-Area Studies (Montréal, Quebec, Canada), 1978.

The Context of Baudelaire's "Le Cygne," University of Durham (Durham, England), 1980.

Baudelaire in 1859: A Study in the Sources of Poetic Creativity, Cambridge University Press (New York, NY), 1988.

Baudelaire and the Second Republic: Writing and Revolution, Clarendon Press (Oxford, England), 1991.

(Editor, with Fred Reno) Les Antilles-Guyane au rendez-vous de l'Europe: Le grand tournant?, Economica (Paris, France), 1994.

La famille coloniale: La Martinique et la mère patrie, 1789-1992, L'Harmattan (Paris, France), 1994.

The Flaneur and His City: Patterns of Daily Life in Paris, 1815-1851, University of Durham (Durham, England), 1994.

(Editor, with Fred Reno) French and West Indian: Martinique, Guadeloupe, and French Guiana Today, University Press of Virginia (Charlottesville, VA), 1995.

Afro-Creole: Power, Opposition, and Play in the Caribbean, Cornell University Press (Ithaca, NY), 1997.

Le Roman Marron: Études sur la littérature martiniquaise contemporaine, L'Harmattan (Paris, France), 1997.

Blood in the City: Violence and Revelation in Paris, 1789-1945, Cornell University Press (Ithaca, NY), 2001.

Prague: A Cultural and Literary History, Interlink Books (New York, NY), 2003.

Holy Tears, Holy Blood: Women, Catholicism, and the Culture of Suffering in France, 1840-1970, Cornell University Press (Ithaca, NY), 2004.

SIDELIGHTS:

Richard D.E. Burton is a writer, scholar, literary critic, and literary historian. He retired from the University of Sussex as a professor of French and Francophone literature, following a long and prolific career. Burton specializes in French and French Caribbean history and literary history. Some of his earliest titles include Assimilation or Independence? Prospects for Martinique and The Context of Baudelaire's "Le Cygne," published in 1978 and 1980, respectively.

After writing The Context of Baudelaire's "Le Cygne," which was Burton's first book on Baudelaire, the author published two more books on the topic in succession. These are Baudelaire in 1859: A Study in the Sources of Poetic Creativity and Baudelaire and the Second Republic: Writing and Revolution, published in 1988 and 1991, respectively. The latter explores Baudelaire's life and work from 1848 to 1851, the period beginning with the Revolution of February 1848 and ending with the Bonapartist coup d'etat of December 1851. This examination casts Baudelaire as a radical republican, and it also provides a social and political view of the author and his writings.

After thoroughly exploring Baudelaire as a topic, Burton wrote about several subjects during the mid to late 1990s, including French and West Indian: Martinique, Guadeloupe, and French Guiana Today, which he edited with Fred Reno. Other books that Burton published in this period are Afro-Creole: Power, Opposition, and Play in the Caribbean and Le Roman Marron: Études sur la littérature martiniquaise contemporaine, both of which were published in 1997. The latter book reviews the work of Edouard Glissant, Patrick Chamoiseau, and Raphael Confiant, all contemporary writers from Martinique. Burton explores the theme of the "Marron," (a word used to refer to runaway slaves or the marooned) as it appears in these authors' works. Burton then goes on to show where each author's treatment of this theme is similar or to point out how it differs. From there, the book examines how the various thematic treatments reflect and/or illuminate the social, political, and cultural climate in Martinique. Celia Britton, reviewing Le Roman Marron in the Modern Language Review, felt that "what [Burton] takes to be inconsistencies in Glissant's representation are in fact, I would argue, a careful and ironic balancing of the positive and negative aspects of the historical reality and the myth." Yet, Britton agreed with Burton's critique of Chamoiseau, which she felt provides "illuminating insights." Britton also commented that Le Roman Marron includes "an extensive and useful bibliography."

Following Le Roman Marron, Burton wrote Blood in the City: Violence and Revelation in Paris, 1789-1945, which was published in 2001. The book was widely reviewed and praised. Indeed, the volume won the Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year award in 2002. In Blood in the City, Burton posits that the bloodshed sparked by the French Revolution in 1789 did not fully come to a conclusion until after the end of the Nazi occupation in 1945. Not only does Burton solidify his argument via discussion of the murders and suicides of public and political figures of the period, but also through an analysis of the literature being produced at the time. The works of authors such as Victor Hugo, Honore de Balzac, Joris-Karl Huysmans, and Emile Zola, to name a few, are examined. Burton also explains the schism between Christian and Protestant religious factions and between those for or against the monarchy, and how these fueled conflicts. Focusing predominantly on the city of Paris, Burton explores the city's monuments and the violent history behind them.

While some critics found Burton's claims in Blood in the City to be controversial, they also considered them to be compelling and well argued. For instance, Christopher Smith, writing in the Modern Language Review, stated that "revisiting Paris with Richard D.E. Burton is an exhilarating experience." Smith called the book an "immensely well-informed study," adding that "Burton writes in an engaging style, generously sharing a rich store of information and the reflections of a particularly lively mind." All in all, Smith felt that "Burton aims hardly less to provoke than to inform in a richly allusive history that has the breath of life and controversy." Echoing Smith's opinions, Library Journal contributor Jim Doyle called Blood in the City a "provocative and original treatise." Concluding his review, Doyle stated that Burton's "work is a worthwhile purchase for both academic and public libraries."

Given the success of Blood in the City, much critical attention was paid to Burton's 2004 volume, Holy Tears, Holy Blood: Women, Catholicism, and the Culture of Suffering in France, 1840-1970. Here, Burton focuses on the notion of Christ's suffering and how that suffering was transformed into a religious practice, particularly by women during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The book explores such religious and literary figures as Melanie Calvat, Therese Martin, Camille Claudel, Marthe Robin, Pauline Lamotte, Eva Lavalliere, Claire Ferchaud, and Simone Weil. Each of these figures sheds light on the topic of emotional, psychological, and physical suffering, and the religious undertones of each.

Holy Tears, Holy Blood was critically acclaimed, with many reviewers commenting on Burton's interesting subject matter and his treatment of it. Susanna Lee, critiquing the book in Nineteenth-Century French Studies, noted: "One important strength of this book is its extraordinary wealth of historical and anecdotal detail … [And] another strength is the range of psychological, anthropological, political, and theological inquiry the book encourages." Overall, Lee reported that the book "raises important and provocative questions," adding that "if it raises more questions than it answers, this does not resonate as a shortcoming precisely because of the richness of narrative detail and the emotional and psychological complexities described. Above all, Holy Tears, Holy Blood tells a great story, or stories." Additional praise was proffered by Church History contributor Nadia M. Lahutsky: "Burton deserves our gratitude for presenting together these complex women and the questions their lives raise."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

African Studies Review, September 1, 1998, Sada Niang, review of Afro-Creole: Power, Opposition, and Play in the Caribbean, p. 179.

American Anthropologist, September 1, 1998, John W. Nunley, review of Afro-Creole, p. 816.

American Historical Review, October 1, 2002, Charles Tilly, review of Blood in the City: Violence and Revelation in Paris, 1789-1945, p. 1303; April 1, 2005, Elinor Accampo, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood: Women, Catholicism, and the Culture of Suffering in France, 1840-1970, p. 564.

Catholic Historical Review, October 1, 2006, Caroline Ford, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood, p. 682.

Choice, September 1, 1992, J.C. McLaren, review of Baudelaire and the Second Republic: Writing and Revolution, p. 122; January 1, 1998, review of Afro-Creole, p. 862; June 1, 2002, G.P. Cox, review of Blood in the City, p. 1872; February 1, 2005, G.P. Cox, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood, p. 1088.

Church History, March 1, 2006, Nadia M. Lahutsky, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood, p. 199.

Commonweal, September 24, 2004, "No Pain, No Gain," p. 24.

French Review, May 1, 1997, James P. McNab, review of The Flaneur and His City: Patterns of Daily Life in Paris, 1815-1851, p. 925; March 1, 1998, Aletha D. Stahl, review of Le Roman Marron: Études sur la littérature martiniquaise contemporaine, p. 670.

French Studies, July 1, 1990, Rosemary Lloyd, review of Baudelaire in 1859: A Study in the Sources of Poetic Creativity, p. 345; October 1, 1992, Graham Robb, review of Baudelaire and the Second Republic, p. 465; April 1, 1996, Sonya Stephens, review of The Flaneur and His City, p. 212.

History: Review of New Books, March 22, 2002, review of Blood in the City, p. 116; March 22, 2002, Eric A. Arnold, review of Blood in the City, p. 116.

Journal of Economic Literature, December 1, 1997, review of Afro-Creole, p. 2171.

Journal of Interdisciplinary History, March 22, 2003, Raymond Jonas, review of Blood in the City, p. 637.

Journal of Modern History, March 1, 2004, Victoria Thompson, review of Blood in the City, p. 191; March 1, 2006, Raymond H. Jonas, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood, p. 226.

Library Journal, August 1, 2001, Jim Doyle, review of Blood in the City, p. 129.

Modern Language Review, July 1, 1990, Peter Collier, review of Baudelaire in 1859, p. 735; April 1, 1998, Celia Britton, review of Le Roman Marron, p. 526; October 1, 2002, Christopher Smith, review of Blood in the City, p. 978.

Nineteenth-Century French Studies, March 22, 1997, Edward K. Kaplan, review of The Flaneur and His City; March 22, 2006, Susanna Lee, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood; March 22, 2007, Susanna Lee, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood.

Times Literary Supplement, March 27, 1992, Graham Robb, review of Baudelaire and the Second Republic, p. 7; December 6, 2002, review of Blood in the City, p. 13; October 15, 2004, Sarah Howard, review of Holy Tears, Holy Blood, p. 30.

Virginia Quarterly Review, March 22, 2002, review of Blood in the City, p. 45.