Short notices

Bonnafous, A., Plassard, F., and Vulin, B., eds., Circuler Demain (DATAR/Éditions de l'Aube, 1993), 191pp., 95R, ISBN 2 87678 126 3

Dioudonnat, P.‐M., Les 700 rédacteurs de ‘Je suis partout’ 1930–1944 (Sedopolis, 1993), 107pp., 240F., ISBN 2 904177 16 7

Furet, F., Revolutionary France 1770–1880 (Blackwell, 1992), 630pp., £40.00, ISBN 0 631 17029 4

Hainsworth, P., ed., The Extreme Right in Europe and the USA (Pinter, 1992), 320pp., £45.00, ISBN 0 86187 790 X

Macchia, G., L'Ange de la nuit. Sur Proust, trans, from the Italian by Marie‐France Merger, Paul Bédarida and Mario Fusco (Gallimard, 1993), 269pp., 130F., ISBN 2 07 072885 4

McPhee, P., A Social History of France 1780–1880 (Routledge, 1993), 347pp., £12.99 pbk, ISBN 0 415 01616 9

Prost, A., ’Les Anciens Combattants’ and French Society 1914–1939 (Berg, 1992), 152pp., £29.95, ISBN 0 85496 672 2 (hbk), £9.95, ISBN 0 85496 337 5 (pbk)

Service d'Information et de Diffusion du Premier Ministre, La politique de la France, aoÛt 1991‐juillet 1992 (La Documentation française, 1993), 165pp., 70F., ISBN 2 11 002915 3

Teich, M., and Porter, R., eds., The National Question in Europe in Historical Context (CUP, 1993), 343pp., £40.00, ISBN 0 521 36441 8 (hbk), £13.95, ISBN 0 521 36713 1 (pbk)     

The Shadow of Napoleon

A number of critics have drawn attention to the increased number of violent women in film, media and literature and to the apparent collusion between women and violence in women's own fiction. This article examines three autofictional works by Duras, Hyvrard and Cixous to see to what extent, and in what ways, these ‘textes de sang’ rewrite and rework incidents of violence in the individual and the family, of self-mutilation and imperialism, and of illness, grief and mourning. In each case, a variety of narrative techniques is employed which enable the writer to engage with, and emerge from, identities affected by violence. In all three cases, the violent fracturing of identity into ‘je/s' and ‘elles' is co-opted into a strengthened authorial voice and a new, uncollusive persona.     

Toward Historical Ethnography: Notarial Records and Family History in the Middle Ages

One can easily use nineteenth-century tithe data of England and Wales in a Geographic Information System (GIS) to analyze a range of subjects, for example, land use, productivity, land ownership, or tenancy. Making the tithe data GIS ready, on the other hand, is a nontrivial matter. The tithe data consist of two main types: spatial, that is, the tithe map, and nonspatial attribute data linked to the map. The tithe therefore has the characteristics of a GIS, albeit in paper form. The author outlines the process of creating the structures for building a data repository that allows the storage and dissemination of both tithe schedules and maps in a single GIS-ready system. The author chose Oracle to host the repository. The Oracle Spatial module allows storage of both spatial and attribute information. Oracle also provides the means of serving data to users via the Internet.