The Great Cat Massacre Analysis

Literacy’s lacking popularity with the non elites stands as one of the most significant difficulties social historians encounter when trying to piece together the lives of European common peoples, as a generally illiterate poor more focused on basic survival than the upkeep of historical records left few written accounts of their personal and local experiences. One of the many approaches historians utilize in piecing together the beliefs and views of the european majority involve the interpretation of the majority’s reading material as representative of the thoughts and relationships with the outer world of the people. This method, however, does not produce as many concise conclusions about the commoners as it does for the elite, as there was, apparently, “a direct relationship [that] existed between the ability to read and write on the one hand and personal wealth and social class on the other" (McKay 227).
The ability to write, often associated with literacy, produced autobiographical life accounts many cultural historians, including The Great Cat Massacre’s author, Robert Darnton, focused on, intent on uncovering the artisanal culture of Eighteenth Century Parisians (Darnton