The beginning of the end

In May 1968, France stood on the verge of full-blooded revolution. Here a rhythmic, vivid evocation from eyewitness Angelo Quattrocchi is complemented by Tom Nairn's cool and elegant appraisal to tell the astonishing story of those heady days. Paris is a seething battlefield of barricades, burning cars and CS gas. De Gaulle's riot police publicly inform him that their loyalty can no longer be taken for granted. Meanwhile students and millions of young striking workers on the streets raise ideas that had previously been the sole province of radical philosophers: "To forbid is forbidden"; "Be reasonable ... Demand the impossible"; "Freedom is the consciousness of our desires."