The Enlightenment: A Genealogy by Dan Edelstein (review)

through the mass of text, the rewards are important: literature and spectacle, word and gesture, are revealed to be eloquent interlocutors. Union College (NY) Charles R. Batson EDELSTEIN, DAN. The Enlightenment: A Genealogy. Chicago: UP of Chicago, 2010. ISBN 978-0-226-18449-4. Pp. 209. $20. The question asked by Edelstein in this thought-provoking essai (to be understood in the context of the French tradition) is not in any way novel or complex : what exactly is the starting point in the genealogy of the Enlightenment? By directly answering the question from the outset, the author chooses not to hold the reader in intellectual suspense: he purports that the Enlightenment is rooted in the Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns, and more specifically, in the key contribution made by French scholars actively engaged in the debate between 1680 and 1720 who, without creating an original method of reasoning or proposing a fresh philosophical worldview, “offered a seductive account of the events and discoveries of the past century, in conjunction with a more overarching history of human civilization” (2). The author thus sees the Quarrel as the instigator of, and catalyst for an extensive and in-depth self-reflection that took place over forty years, during which the present was thoroughly examined while the past lingered prominently in the background. Some of the most important running threads of the discussion are, as expected, the spread of the scientific revolution, the place of antiquity in the (pre-)Enlightenment narrative (given the importance attached to classical learning and ancient philosophy by the philosophes), the French academies as initial filters for the works and practices of this intellectual phenomenon , and the mechanism of cultural transformation in eighteenth-century Europe. By situating its headquarters in France, “the recognized trendsetter of the age” (3), and more specifically in Paris, “the universally acknowledged capital of the Enlightenment” (4), the author breaks away from current hypotheses, which postulate that the Enlightenment was directly linked to political and philosophical developments that occurred in England and the Dutch Republic. He further proposes that, if on the current world stage France has lamentably lost its political and cultural centrality, it may now appear natural to find that Spinoza, Newton, and Locke have replaced Bayle, Montesquieu, and Voltaire in critical (re)assessments of the Enlightenment. It is not that contributions made by the former trio should be neglected, as the author is careful to clarify, but the significant place occupied in the history of eighteenth-century thought by the latter trio should continue to be fully recognized. Dismissing as “unlikely” the possibility of a coexistence of “varying regional or confessional Enlightenments [that] were entirely the result of homegrown social and intellectual movements” (at the moment a favored argument of conference papers that attempt to valorize a particular author, intellectual current, form of sociability, or political revolution, all deservedly worthy of attention in their own right, and not just as national or regional manifestations of a specific Enlightenment), Edelstein argues persuasively that, instead, “a singular concept of the Enlightenment was made available to different cultures, which in turn adapted it” (3), and this concept originated in France. If the thesis is clearly stated and concisely defended, the intended readership for this work is more difficult to circumscribe: while the notes are copious, providing 386 FRENCH REVIEW 86.2 reliable syntheses and bibliographical documentation on most matters under consideration (an objective, after all, is to draw a map of scholarship on the Enlightenment using both recent and classic secondary sources), following the argument nonetheless presupposes an ‘enlightened’ reader with a fairly extensive knowledge of the period. Despite its affordable price and reader-friendly format, it could not serve as a textbook. History students at the advanced level of undergraduate studies will probably navigate through the arguments presented with relative ease and success, but graduate students and established scholars interested in the history of ideas and the Enlightenment are more likely the ones who will be able to fill in the blanks, insert ideas in their appropriate context, and fully appreciate the study’s implications. Mount Allison University (Canada) Christina Ionescu GAINES, JAMES F. Molière and Paradox: Skepticism and Theater in the...