This course focuses on the history of 18th century French literature and ideas. It aims to present the entire century, the works and the authors as well as the battles of ideas that span the Enlightenment. The emphasis will be on the “great authors” (Montesquieu, Prévost, Marivaux, Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, Sade…) who constitute the cultural background required to have a general idea of the century., but without neglecting everything that recent research has highlighted in terms of fundamental movements, represented by authors who have a less individualized place in the literary pantheon but who are nonetheless important (underground texts, libertine novels, development of women of letters, etc.).
We will take care to provide the elements of historical framing which allow to locate the important mutations of the dynamic genres of the moment (novel, theater) as well as the intellectual debates and the way in which they are embodied in major works.
