Panorama of Paris—Selections from Le Tableau De Paris

Mercier's Le Tableau de Paris , published from 1781 to 1788, is one of the forgotten treasures of French literature, offering a wealth of vivid portraits of Parisian life. Mercier was a pioneering urban ethnographer, a participant observer who described the society around him with the same sense of curiosity that drove the period's explorers to portray the natives of remote Pacific islands. He was a philanthropically minded reformer who used his pages to denounce ills ranging from inadequate garbage removal to traffic jams. This is an abridged edition with a new introduction and new b&w illustrations and maps. Paper edition $16.95. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Jeremy D. Popkin is Professor of History at the University of Kentucky. His books includeRevolutionary News: The Press in France, 1789–1799 (1990) and A Short History of the French Revolution (1998).