A groundbreaking biographical study of enslaved people and their struggle for freedom in pre-Revolutionary Paris, by an award-winning historian of the history of France and the French Empire.
In the decades before the French Revolution, when Paris was celebrated as an oasis of freedom, slaves took refuge there, hoping to break free. They envisioned Paris as a refuge from France's notorious slave-trading ports.The French were late entrants to the slave trade, but controlled the global slave market by the late 1780s. This massive growth turned Paris, the cultural capital of the Enlightenment, into a dangerous place for enslaved people.Those seeking freedom in Paris faced persecution, arrests, and forced deportation. Some of them turned to lawyers, believing that the city courts would free them. By examining the lives of those whose dashed hopes and creative determination embodied the spirit of that era, Miranda Spieler illuminates a hidden story of slavery and the struggle for freedom.Runaway slaves ran into spy networks, prying neighbors, and overlapping jurisdictions. Their secret life left documented traces. In a work of historical investigation, Spieler retraces their steps and unveils the new racist legal culture that has permeated every aspect of daily life.The author presents vivid and accurate portraits of men, women and children who came from Africa, the Caribbean and the Indian Ocean. Through it, we learn about their strategies, their hiding places, their family history, and their relationships with prominent figures from the Enlightenment. “Slaves in Paris” is a history of oppressed peoples, and it is also a tribute to their resilience.
