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- The years following 1789 in France saw many changes in the lives of men, women and children . The revolutionary governments took it upon themselves to pass laws that would translate the ideals of liberty and equality into everyday practice.
- After the storming of the Bastille in the summer of 1789 one important law that came into effect was the abolition of censorship .
- In the Old Regime all written material and cultural activities – books , newspapers , plays – could be published or performed only after they had been approved by the censors of the king .
- Now the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen proclaimed freedom of speech and expression to be a natural right so newspapers , pamphlets , books and printed pictures flooded the towns of France from where they travelled rapidly into the countryside .
- They all described and discussed the events and changes taking place in France .
- Freedom of the press also meant that opposing views of events could be expressed.
- Each side sought to convince the others of its position through the medium of print .
- Plays , songs and festive processions attracted large numbers of people .
- This was one way they could grasp and identify with ideas such as liberty or justice that political philosophers wrote about at length in texts which only a handful of educated people could read .
- Marat, a journalist , addressing the people ,
- He was an unofficial bond with the radical Jacobin party that came to power after June 1793 with his journal, L'Ami du Peuple (Friend of the People).
