Zoe Ann Stoltz

March 8, 2002

Changing Farm Practices in Retif  

 

Nicholas Retif would have us believe that his father was the epitome of manhood in France during the eighteenth century.  One of the tools the author used to convince the reader of his father’s virtues was the ingenuity displayed by his father in his farming practices, specifically in his use and management of farmland.  While Nicholas’ story exaggerated the virtues of his father, the many references to experimental farm practices indicated a trend toward changing farm practices during the lifetimes of Nicholas and his father, Edme.

            Although Retif mentioned his father’s farming talents in numerous passages, the narrative listed many specifics regarding Edme’s time in Saci.  Stone removal and the cultivation of previously fallow ground proved to be Edme’s initial improvements.  He gained confidence in his ideas and boldly experimented by planting vines on “unploughable slopes” (Retif 61).  The establishment of vines proved effective for a time.  When, following years of growth, this practice exhausted the soil, Edme discovered the benefits of rotating lucerne with the vines.  Edme continued his revitalizing farming techniques by experimenting with crop rotation and creating the means of increasing the production of fodder for the benefit of the manure, or fertilizer-producing livestock.

            In spite of Retif’s exaggerations, his descriptions reflected changing attitudes among the peasantry regarding their farming practices.  The innovations in farming and land use presented by Retif bear significance due to centuries of peasant resistance to change. In describing the attitude of peasants regarding agriculture, Roche wrote, “change was inevitably seen as a break with the past and a potential threat to the stability of the family” (Roche 118).  Gerald Cavanaugh described the importance of villages retaining “immemorial custom” (Cavanaugh 28).  Contrary to centuries of unyielding attitudes, Retif reported that following the success of Edme’s vines, other “hard working men of Saci imitated him by planting vines on the uncultivated slopes, and because they were created from nothing, the return was soon greater than that on their own land” (Retif 61).  Retif not only described experimentation and modification, but also emphasized the welcoming attitude with which their success was viewed and imitated. 

            Gerald Cavanaugh, in his “A French Peasant Community in the Old Regime,” Daniel Roche in “France in the Enlightenment, “ confirmed the renovations occurring in French agriculture.  Cavanaugh reported that during the eighteenth century France witnessed a “vast expansion of viticulture” resulting from expanding markets and changing peasant economies (Cavanaugh 29).  The “winds of change,” according to Roche, blew through French farm lands under the guise of newer uses of fallow lands, including the introduction of “peas, broad beans, green beans, string beans, turnips, beets, as well as fodder crops that could be fed to livestock” (Roche 115).  The two historians agreed that despite the stubborn tendencies of the French peasants, the eighteenth century witnessed a transformation of farming practices.

            Le Roy Ladurie, in his scathing “Retif de la Bretonne as a Social Anthropologist,” insisted the experiments reported by Retif implied nothing unusual, yet he too admitted the existence of evolving farm practices.  “All Edme did,” according to Ladurie, “was roll up his sleeves and add to the usual practices an extra helping of human labour” (Ladurie 226). Ladurie reported the eighteenth century did not witness “any major innovations” (Ladurie 226).  Ladurie continued, however, by explaining that eighteenth century farming  “was more adaptable, more efficient and more productive than the seventeenth”(Ladurie 226).  This final passage from Ladurie successfully contradicted h[RMS1] is previous argument.  The French peasant may not have witnessed drastic, or revolutionary,  shifts in farming practices but some form of evolution existed to produce increased efficiency and productivity.  

            The variations in agricultural practices presented in My Father’s Life, reflected other changes occurring in the French peasantry and in France. Robert Schwartz’s essay, “The Peasant as Hero,” explained the changing attitude of the French middle class and intelligentsia toward the peasant.  Rousseau’s hero, according to Schwartz,  “was a man of civic virtue, an individual whose sentiments and deeds were devoted to the happiness of others” (Schwartz 3). This philosophy defined Retif’s descriptions of his father.  In Changing Lives, Bonnie Smith specifically addressed how evolving farm practices effected women’s lives.  The “revolution in agriculture,” towards the end of the eighteenth century, precipitated a “trend toward private, rather than communal, control of farming” (Smith 45).  The privatization of lands forced men and women to become laborers, specifically, textile workers.  This movement away from direct dependence on the land led to a redefinition of the patriarchal approach to family and child rearing. This “shift from a shame psychology to a guilt psychology,” in maintaining familial control, was emphasized by Poster, and resulted in a “lighter and more systematic” form of punishment in the family (Poster 234-235).  The numerous changes occurring in the peasant’s relationship with land, farming practices and philosophy reflected simultaneous changes in family dynamics and control.

            Class discussions regarding historical change included the patriarchal system, acceptable behavior in men, portrayal of emotion, parental affection, and the perception and upbringing of children.  Retif covered many of these issues in his father’s biography.  The experimentation reported by Retif in village agricultural practices, specifically, signify evidence of historical change in the peasants’ relationship with the land during the eighteenth century.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

Cavanaugh, Gerald. “A French Peasant Community in the Old Regime.” People and Communities in the Western World. Edited by Gene Briacher.  Homewood, Illinois: Dorsey Press, 1979.

 

De la Bretonne. My Father’s Life. Gloucester, GL: Alan Sutton Publishing Limited, 1986.

 

Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel.  The Mind and Method of the Historian.  Chicago, Illinois: The University of Chicago Press, 1981.

 

Poster, Mark. “Patriarchy and Sexuality: Restif and the Peasant Family.”  The Eighteenth Century., 1984.

 

Roche, Daniel. France in the Enlightenment. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1998.

 

Schwartz, Robert. “The Peasant as Hero: Rousseau, Retif de le Bretonne, and the Representation of Rustic Virtue.” Dijon: Publications of Centre Georges Chevrier, 2000.

 

Smith, Bonnie. Changing Lives. Lexington, Massachusetts: D.C. Heath and Company, 1989.

 

 

 

 

Main Point (the major conclusion you draw after you’ve worked through the analysis of your topic. Two or three sentences and no more than a succinct paragraph. WRITE THIS LAST.)	A well stated and original thesis/main point.  I like the change dimension of it.And the agrarian dimension, too.
Historical Change (In a brief paragraph, describe the most important aspect of change that you have discovered in your study of your topic and give at least one example of evidence that supports your point. Whenever you cite evidence, reference the source in parenthesis: see below.)	As I read you, your essay combines this category with the following two in a single argument about Edmond’s agrarian experiments as reflective of broader agrarian change in the 18th century.  Hence you suggest that the glowing reports in MFL were not just the result of an admiring son’s glorification but something real as well.
Representation by Observer  (State in a brief paragraph and include one example of supporting evidence. A contemporary observer could be a writer, artist, eyewitness, etc. of the time.)
Reality of the Observed (State in a paragraph what you think can be ascertained about the reality or “facts” about the person, event, or idea being represented by a contemporary observer and include one example of supporting evidence.
Empathetic Understanding
Historians’ differing interpretations (Choose at least two interpretations among Smith, Charelton, Poster, Le Roy Ladurie, and Schwartz that are relevant to the main point and evidence you are discussing.  In one or two brief paragraphs, describe the differences you find in their interpretations of something related to your topic.)	Excellent use of Cavanaugh and Roche, both to add substance to your own argument and to point out differing interpretive emphasis in Le Roy Ladurie. Then you go on later to compare Schwartz, Smith, and Poster, perhaps as further instances of “connections” to be appreciated among the various primary and secondary sources.  The reasoning linking Rousseau, individualism, and the shift from shame to guilt is nothing if not ingenious, and by enunciating “individualism” as the main thread the connections would be more easily grasped. I like the linking of complexities, and a whole essay could be used to clarify and amply this.
Connections (You have made several connections in the relating the differing interpretations to your topic.  Here in two or three sentences, explain how one additional primary or secondary source that you have not yet mentions sheds light on your examination.)	as noted above.
Works Cited (On a separate page at the end, give the full citations of each source you have cited in your abstract: author, title, journal title if an article from a periodical, place and date of publication, journal title.	Fine
Main Criteria for Evaluation:
·         the quality and specificity of your historical claims and reasoning	·         Excellent in many ways
·         the accuracy and appropriateness of the historical evidence cited to support your claims (the appropriateness of evidence depends upon the degree to which there is a clear link between the evidence and the idea or claim being made.)	·         Although I’d like to have seen more evidence marshaled from MFL, as the assignment requested, you have mobilized the secondary accounts with skill to make your interesting argument clear, well substantiated, and persuasive.
·         the clarity of your prose	·         Well done here. Nice improvement over the first essay.
GRADE	A (though you stray from the strict constructionist view of the assignment, you do so with skill.) Bravo.