{"product_id":"9781442654242","title":"Correspondance générale d'Helvétius, Volume II: 1757-1760 \/ Lettres 250-464","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis second volume of the \u003ci\u003eCorrespondance générale d'Helvétius\u003c\/i\u003e covers the period of the publication and reception of Helvétius' controversial first work, \u003ci\u003eDe l'Esprit\u003c\/i\u003e (1758). It begins with a letter of January 1757, in which Helvétius recounts the attempt by Damiens on the life of Louis XV, and ends in December 1760 when the author, having been attacked on the stage of the Théatre-Francais but eulogized in foreign journals, is contemplating voluntary exile.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn the meantime \u003ci\u003eDe l'Esprit\u003c\/i\u003e provoked an uprecedented outcry from the court and from the religious and civil authorities. Denigrated as the epitome of all dangerous philosophic trends of the age, condemned as atheistic, materialistic, sacriligious, immoral, and subversive, it enjoyed an immense \u003ci\u003esucces de scandale.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eRather than examining the puzzles and paradoxes which surround the \u003ci\u003eaffaire de l'Esprit\u003c\/i\u003e, this volume presents the documents upon which solutions may be based. Helvétius' own letters, often written hastily, under stress, and in fear they might be opened by the Cabinet noir, are less revealing than the letters between other protagonists in the \u003ci\u003eaffaire\u003c\/i\u003e: the Cardinal de Bernis and the Duke de Choiseul, Jean-Omer Joly de Fleury, Malesherbes, Saint-Florentin, Tercier, and Louis xv himself.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIt is these letters, together with the appendixes containing edicts, retractions, an condemnations that shed new light not only on the development of the \u003ci\u003eaffaire\u003c\/i\u003e but also on the complex workings of the ancien regime\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University of Toronto Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47128379130096,"sku":"9781442654242","price":142.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781442654242_p0.jpg?v=1763815067","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781442654242","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}