Consuming the Past: The Medieval Revival in fin-de-siecle France

From pilgrimages to popular festivals, from modern spectacles to advertising, from the work of avant-garde painters to the novels of Emil Zola, "Consuming the Past" explores the complexity of the fin-de-siecle French fascination with the Middle Ages. The authors map the cultural history of the period from the end of the Franco-Prussian war to the 1905 separation of Church and State illuminating the powerful appeal that the medieval past held for a society undergoing the rapid changes of industrialization. Challenging the prevailing notion that this was a mere passing fashion seized upon by the tourist industry and the manufacturers of cards and bibelots, the authors argue that popular and scholarly interest evolved together and strongly influenced the emergence of fresh ideas about French identity, art, history and religion.