Leibniz
An Intellectual Biography

This intellectual biography surveys Leibniz'ss interests and offers a portrait of a unique thinker, identifying the master project that inspired his huge range of endeavors.

Maria Rosa Antognazza (Author)

9781107627611, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 19 September 2011

652 pages, 8 b/w illus. 1 map
22.9 x 15 x 4.3 cm, 0.95 kg

'… the book is first-rate; the level of detail and its relation to Leibniz's various intellectual projects is appropriate and useful. For early modern scholars, this biography will serve as a vital reference work.' History

Of all the thinkers of the century of genius that inaugurated modern philosophy, none lived an intellectual life more rich and varied than Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716). Maria Rosa Antognazza's pioneering biography provides a unified portrait of this unique thinker and the world from which he came. At the centre of the huge range of Leibniz's apparently miscellaneous endeavours, Antognazza reveals a single master project lending unity to his extraordinarily multifaceted life's work. Throughout the vicissitudes of his long life, Leibniz tenaciously pursued the dream of a systematic reform and advancement of all the sciences. As well as tracing the threads of continuity that bound these theoretical and practical activities to this all-embracing plan, this illuminating study also traces these threads back into the intellectual traditions of the Holy Roman Empire in which Leibniz lived and throughout the broader intellectual networks that linked him to patrons in countries as distant as Russia and to correspondents as far afield as China.

Part I. Youthful Vocations (1646–76): 1. The birth of a vision: background, childhood, and education (July 1646–March 1667)
2. The vision broadens: Nuremberg, Frankfurt, and Mainz (March 1667–March 1672)
3. Old wine in new bottles: Paris, London, and Holland (March 1672–December 1676)
Part II. Dreams and Reality (1676–1716): 4. A universal genius as librarian, historian, and mining engineer: Hanover and Lower Saxony (December 1676–October 1687)
5. In the footsteps of the Guelfs: southern Germany, Austria, and Italy (November 1687–June 1690)
6. Back under the Guelf Dukes: Hanover and Wolfenbüttel (June 1690–February 1698)
7. Between brother and sister: Hanover and Berlin (February 1698–February 1705)
8. Light and shadows: Hanover, Berlin, Wolfenbüttel, Vienna (February 1705–September 1714)
9. Epilogue: last years in Hanover (September 1714–November 1716).

Subject Areas: History of science [PDX], Philosophy of science [PDA], History of ideas [JFCX], Philosophy of religion [HRAB], History of Western philosophy [HPC]