L. J. Connors, Dramatic battles in eighteenth-century France: philosophes, anti-philosophes and polemical theatre

Logan J. Connors, Dramatic battles in eighteenth-century France : philosophes, anti-philosophes and polemical theatre

Voltaire Foundation, SVEC 2012, xii+272 pages.

ISBN : 978-0-7294-1047-2

Prix : £65 / €85 / $110

The mid-eighteenth century witnessed a particularly intense conflict between the Enlightenment philosophes and their enemies, when intellectual and political confrontation became inseparable from a battle for public opinion. By analysing the most indicative examples of France’s polemical theatre of the period, Les Philosophes by Charles Palissot (1760) and Voltaire’s Le Café ou L’Ecossaise (1760), Connors explores the emergence of spectators as active agents in French society, and shows how theatre achieved an unrivalled status as a cultural weapon on the eve of the French Revolution.

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