XVII-XVIII (Dec 2022)
« I have a dreadful story to tell you » : stratégies informatives et narratives pro-ministérielles dans l’affaire Guiscard
Abstract
On 8 March 1711 Robert Harley, Chancellor of the Exchequer, was stabbed by a French renegade. This dramatic event, combining politics and human tragedy, led to a surge in publication, mixing high and low politics, national and international interests, as well as informative, but also narrative, strategies. From the Whig opposition’s instrumentalisation of the event, looking to foster support for the War of the Spanish Succession effort, to pro-ministerial writers’ re-invention of Harley’s public persona as a martyr and a patriot, to specialised sections of the press’s attempts at preserving their Huguenot refugee readers from popular outrage, this affair sheds light on both the political and information crises that shook the last years of Queen Anne’s reign. Analysing press extracts, pamphlets, poems and engravings, this article discusses information and dissemination practices, as well as public opinion manipulation and propaganda strategies in the period.
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