Dynamite Club

How a Bombing in Fin-de-Siecle Paris Ignited the Age of Modern Terror

Merriman John M.

Distinguished historian John Merriman maintains that the Age of Modern Terror began in Paris on February 12, 1894, when anarchist Emile Henry set off a bomb in the Cafe Terminus, killing one and wounding twenty French citizens. The true story of the circumstances that led a young radical to commit a cold-blooded act of violence against innocent civilians makes for riveting reading, shedding new light on the terrorist mindset and on the subsequent worldwide rise of anarchism by deed. Merriman's fascinating study of modern history's first terrorists, emboldened by the invention of dynamite, reveals much about the terror of today.

About the Author

John Merriman is Charles Seymour Professor of History at Yale University, where he teaches French and Modern European History. He received Yale's Harwood F. Byrnes/Richard B. Sewall Teaching Prize in 2000, and was awarded a Docteur Honoris Causa in France in 2002. His many books include "Dynamite Club: How A Cafe Bombing Ignited the Age of Modern Terror" (2009), "Police Stories: Making the French State, 1815-1851" (2005), "The Stones of Balazuc: A French Village in Time" (2002), "A History of Modern Europe since the Renaissance" (1996), "The Margins of City Life: Explorations on the French Urban Frontier" (1991) and "The Agony of the Republic: The Repression of the Left in Revolutionary France, 1848-1851" (Yale, 1978).

Reviews

"In... his enthralling and cinematic account of a Paris cafe bombing in 1894, Merriman achieves that rare thing: virtuosic storytelling that doubles as superb history" – Kirk Davis Swinehart, Chicago Tribune

"Historically eye-opening and psychologically insightful" – Chuck Leddy, Boston Globe

"Those who think of terrorism as an inexplicable evil produced by an alien culture will have their eyes opened by this fascinating study of 19th-century anarchist terrorists" – San Francisco Examiner

"Merriman's account frames an illuminating study of working-class radicalism in belle epoque France and its bitter conflict with the establishment in an age when class warfare was no metaphor. It [is] an absorbing true crime story, with Dostoyevskian overtones, about high ideals that motivate desperate acts" – Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Reconstructing Henry's own attacks, Merriman allies a forensic eye with the texture of Paris de la belle epoque, ably renders Henry's personality, and implicitly invites comparison of his with the mid-sets of contemporary terrorists" – Gilbert Taylor, Booklist

"Reading a book on nineteenth-century anarchism by John Merriman is a bit like reading one on the semicolon by Strunk and White... he is able to pack in riveting detail" – Bookforum

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