1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910456527903321

Autore

Andrew Edward <1941->

Titolo

Patrons of enlightenment / / Edward G. Andrew

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Toronto, [Ontario] ; ; Buffalo, [New York] ; ; London, [England] : , : University of Toronto Press, , 2006

©2006

ISBN

1-281-99184-8

9786611991845

1-4426-7831-3

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (295 p.)

Disciplina

190.9033

Soggetti

Enlightenment

Philosophers - Europe - History - 18th century

Authors and patrons - Europe - History - 18th century

Electronic books.

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1. Patronage of Philosophy -- 2. Enlightenment and Print Culture -- 3. Seneca in the Age of Frederick and Catherine -- 4. Patronage and the Modes of Liberal Tolerance: Bayle, Care, and Locke -- 5. Voltaire and His Female Protectors -- 6. Scottish Universities and Their Patrons: Argyll, Bute, and Dundas -- 7. Independence in Theory and Practice: D'Alembert and Rousseau -- 8. Samuel Johnson and the Question of Enlightenment in England -- 9. Irish Antagonists: Burke and Shelburne -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

All major writers of the Enlightenment enjoyed royal or aristocratic patronage, often denying their financial dependency and claiming to live by the labours of their pens or by the expanding readership of the eighteenth century, thereby maintaining the ideal of intellectual autonomy.In Patrons of Enlightenment, Edward G. Andrew examines the conditions in which the central idea of Enlightenment was fabricated; intellectual autonomy was constructed while patronage was being transformed by a commercial print culture. Andrew further argues that



since an Enlightenment depends on a relationship of plebeian genius and patrician taste, England could not have had one - as the French and Scots did - because after the English civil war, plebeians did not contribute to the intellectual culture of England.Patrons of Enlightenment emphasizes the dependency of thinkers upon patrons and compares the patron-client relationships in the French, English, and Scottish republics of letters. Andrew challenges philosophers to rethink the Platonic distinction between philosophers and sophists and the Aristotelian view of philosophers as godlike in their self-sufficiency.