Michel Gauchet on Robespierre (review)

 The New York Review of Books (June 23rd) publishes an essay by Lynn Hunt on Michel Gauchet's  Robespierre:  the Man who Divides Us Most, which has just been published in English translation by Princeton U.P.

I, the People | Lynn Hunt | The New York Review of Books (nybooks.com)

A new book on Robespierre is always an "event" but Michel Gauchet's book is probably mostly of interest to political philosophers: 

"Both the virtues and the defects of Gauchet’s approach are on view in Robespierre: The Man Who Divides Us Most, which is mercifully short in comparison with many of his other books. The defects are easily recounted: he largely ignores what has been written by others about his subject (whether democracy in general or Robespierre in particular) and glides past the nitty-gritty of everyday politics and social tensions in order to concentrate on the ways in which Robespierre fits into his larger arguments about democracy."