A monarch against his century

I read with great pleasure the "Louis XVI" Jean-Christian Petitfils. I literally devoured his "Louis XV" with the same happiness. In a style that is both fluid and captivating, JCP offers us a more balanced and nuanced portrait of this secret and reserved monarch, who do not trust easily and loved decide alone.
But the other advantage of this splendid biography is to tell us what devolution 18th century, profound changes and repeated crises that herald the coming revolutionary tumult.
Recurring conflicts with the parliaments of the kingdom (magistrates assemblies), rise of a class industrious claiming a right to speech, considerable development of printing with pamphlets, pamphlets and books of reflection and prospective emergence of "philosophers "(Montesquieu, Voltaire, Diderot, d'Alembert) and progressive thinking, a phenomenon salons which are all echo chambers for new ideas The century that changed everything here is told with precision and vivacity.
This is why this biography is fascinating: it is not only of a king, his wars, his mistresses and his court; it is also a monarch who tried to deal with this extraordinarily agitated century Enlightenment, which will eventually take his successor and destroy the absolute monarchy.
Read "Louis XV", and if you have the energy to read as "Louis XVI" you through these two kings full and captivating panorama of one of the most important centuries of the history of France, thanks a historian who is also a talented writer.