The Cambridge Companion to the French Enlightenment

Offers new perspectives on a period that marks the beginning of modern intellectual culture and political life.

Daniel Brewer (Edited by)

9781107626140, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 27 October 2014

265 pages, 2 maps
22.8 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.39 kg

'This stimulating collection of essays examines the French Enlightenment from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. … for more advanced students this Companion will be an invaluable and irreplaceable guide to the most prominent re-evaluations of the French Enlightenment over the last two decades.' Nicholas Cronk, French Studies

The Enlightenment has long been seen as synonymous with the beginnings of modern Western intellectual and political culture. As a set of ideas and a social movement, this historical moment, the 'age of reason' of the seventeenth and eighteenth century, is marked by attempts to place knowledge on new foundations. The Cambridge Companion to the French Enlightenment brings together essays by leading scholars representing disciplines ranging from philosophy, religion and literature, to art, medicine, anthropology and architecture, to analyse the French Enlightenment. Each essay presents a concise view of an important aspect of the French Enlightenment, discussing its defining characteristics, internal dynamics and historical transformations. The Companion discusses the most influential reinterpretations of the Enlightenment that have taken place during the last two decades, reinterpretations that both reflect and have contributed to important re-evaluations of received ideas about the Enlightenment and the early modern period more generally.

Chronology
1. The Enlightenment today? Daniel Brewer
2. Private lives, public space: a new social history of the Enlightenment Antoine Lilti
3. Anthropology Andrew Curran
4. Commerce Paul Cheney
5. Science J. B. Shank
6. Political thought Dan Edelstein
7. Sex and gender, feeling and thinking: imagining women as intellectuals Julie Candler Hayes
8. Religion Charly Coleman
9. Art and aesthetic theory: claiming Enlightenment as viewers and critics Jennifer Milam
10. Enlightenment literature Thomas DiPiero
11. Philosophe/philosopher Stéphane Van Damme
12. Music Downing A. Thomas
13. Architecture and the Enlightenment Anthony Vidler
14. Medicine and the body in the French Enlightenment Anne Vila
15. Space, geography, and the global French Enlightenment Charles W. J. Withers
Guide to further reading.

Subject Areas: History: theory & methods [HBA], Literature: history & criticism [DS]