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 Posted: Mon Jul 27, 2009 10:20 pm
I. Freaking. Love. Saint-Just. I think he's fascinating.
I first stumbled across him going through deviantART, learned more about him, and ended up doing my World History project on him a few years ago.
He was a political writer during the French Revolution, and was executed by guillotine on le 28 juillet 1794.
More information on Saint-Just.
This was another assignment for my creative writing class that I wrote at the time I was working on my history project on l'Ange de la Mort.
* * *
It was mind-numbing. He had come so far so quickly, and now it would all be for nothing. Come morning, he -- Louis Antoine Léon de Saint-Just, l'Archange de la Révoltuion -- would know God.
He watched silently as the others took their last stand; they would not die by the hands of their enemies. They would rather expedite their own demises than give their opponents the satisfaction.
Robespierre and Le Bas were wrestling on one side of their makeshift cell when there was a sudden, loud sound -- a gunshot. Maximilien fell to the floor, clutching at his shattered jaw, helpless to prevent Le Bas raising the gun a second, final time.
Couthon had clambered out of his wheelchair and was cowering beneath a table as two guards rushed into the room in time to see Augustin leap from the window.
Louis watched, impassive as ever, as the guards seized the cripple from his hiding place and dragged him out onto the landing.
It was a curious thing, death, and it had been the dominating thought for the past several years. The death of Louis XVI, the death of friends, the death of enemies -- even the name they had given him: l'Ange de la Mort. The Angel of Death.
Louis silently settled in for the night. In a matter of hours, l'ange de la mort would see heaven.
The guillotine was waiting.
* * *
"I contemn the dust of which I am made, this dust that speaks to you now; it can be persecuted, it can be brought to death, but I challenge the world to take from me that part of me which will live on through the centuries and survive in the skies."
- Louis de Saint-Just, 28 July 1794
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Posted: Tue Jul 28, 2009 9:04 am
This was interesting, though a little confusing, but I think it is my unfamiliaraity with famous artists more than anything else.
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Posted: Tue Jul 28, 2009 9:45 am
It was... dull. There was no emotion in it at all. I don't know anything about these historical figures in your story so maybe that contributed to it a little, but the thing that makes history class so tiresome for people is that textbooks deliver the story in a "here's what happened" way. That is what this work sounded like. This happened then that happened. Even the description to the events was bland. There was no flare in it at all... Sorry if I sound mean, but that's how it sounded to me: dull.
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Posted: Tue Jul 28, 2009 9:46 am
I probably should have given a little more background on what the setting was.
It's 27 July 1794 -- the night before they're all supposed to be guillotined.
Of the five men, Saint-Just was the only one actually able to walk to the guillotine (true story).
Robespierre was shot in the jaw -- nobody knows if it was attempted suicide or if someone else shot him.
Le Bas killed himself.
Guards threw Couthon (already a cripple) down a flight of stairs.
Augustin threw himself out a window in an attempted suicide -- I think they were on the third floor -- but lived.
This was supposed to just be some angsty inner-thought thing. Saint-Just didn't say anything at all the night before he died, so I kind of went with him watching impassively.
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Posted: Tue Jul 28, 2009 9:49 am
@ ATW
No, it's fine.
It's nice to get some blunt honesty every once in a while.
If it's worth anything, I wasn't particularly proud of this; I was just going through some old stuff and found it. But you're right, it is a little dull.
I don't plan on ever going back to it, though, so it'll probably stay the way it is.
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Posted: Thu Jul 30, 2009 6:16 am
Knowing the back story helps a little, but overall, I agree with ATW. This is something that history buffs/history teachers would enjoy, but I didn't take much interest in it.
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