Talk:Republic of Letters

I tried clarifying the last paragraph of the intro, but I don't see how the second sentence bears on the first. The second sentence seems to say that the Republic of Letters and the Enlightenment were separable, distinct things, but that doesn't resolve the controversy referred to in the first sentence. In fact, the premise of the first sentence is that the two phenomena are distinct. So, my revision (from "were distinctive identities" to "were distinct") clarifies the language in a way that leaves the point obscure.

I'm also worried about the seemingly blithe claim of what "most" historians agree on. (I removed the word "stolidly" since it either refers to the mental state of historians or it was supposed to be "solidly.")

In fact, I'm worried that this article has gotten so far without anyone bothering to make a talk page. dweinberger (talk) 11:36, 7 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Is it really true that there were no academies incorporated before 1700 -- or is that true only for England? I won't mention the French Academy, but what about all the numerous Italian academies? Arcadia, Accademia dei Lincei (to which Galileo belonged) and so on -- were they unofficial?Mballen (talk) 05:18, 7 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Academy of Arcadia founded 1690, but had its beginnings much earlier in the circle around the exiled Queen Christina in Rome. Handel was a member.Mballen (talk) 05:27, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

Strange Article
This article is about some feminist or nonfeminist idea of the Rep of Letters; it does not meet wikipedia standards as it does not explain what the subject is before jumping into ideological versions. Needs serious editing. BajaaS (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 20:04, 1 September 2010 (UTC).
 * the article clearly starts by defining it as: "self-proclaimed community of scholars and literary figures". Anyone with additional good information should add it instead of complaining about the hard work by editors who have added sophisticated information to the article.  Rjensen (talk) 20:06, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not complaining about the sophistication of the articles; it is just that one does not start by processing these obscure feminist theories before offering a NEUTRAL historical description of the movement.BajaaS (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:02, 25 September 2010 (UTC).
 * I agree with BajaaS. This article is strangely out of balance & would benefit from refactoring. -- llywrch (talk) 00:59, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree as well. This article seems to contain an extremely undue weight on the female salons, when that was only a small part of what is generally known as the Republic of letters. Some major trimming seems in order here. --Saddhiyama (talk) 01:24, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * the article reflects the recent RS, which emphasize the women. If people have additional sourced information they should add it, not erase high quality material on latest scholarship merely because it deals with the half the people they are uninterested in. Rjensen (talk) 01:35, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * It is also a question of choosing sources. Just because there are recent sources on the influence of women on the republic of letters, doesn't mean that it should outweigh the generel presentation of the subject. A section on the influence of women is warranted, but it is still a fact that they represented only a small minority in the republic of letters at the time, and this should be reflected in the article. A salon (gathering) does not equal the republic of letters, and any extensive information on that subject should be added to that particular article. And oh yeah, misogynist accusations, really? --Saddhiyama (talk) 10:47, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * really -- as in these obscure feminist theories before offering a NEUTRAL historical description of the movement. [above] Rjensen (talk) 10:50, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I had hoped you would reply to the more recent criticism, instead of focusing on some comment that is several months old and which is not representative of the general view. --Saddhiyama (talk) 11:00, 18 December 2010 (UTC)


 * My concern was not with what the reliable sources or recent research may say, but that it did not provide the answers I came to the article to find. I was reading Richard Yeo's Encyclopedic Visions: Scientific Dictionaries and Enlightenment Culture, which has an opening chapter entitled "Encyclopedias in the Republic of Letters"; however, Yeo does not explain just what "Republic of Letters" was -- a self-identified movement (if so what were the characteristics of this movement?), a rubric applied in retrospect by scholars in general -- or only by one specific school of scholars, or even just one person. The first thing I encountered after skimming thru the lead paragraphs was the statement: "Anglo-American historians have turned their attention to the Enlightenment's dissemination and promotion, inquiring into the mechanisms by which it played a role in the collapse of the Ancien Régime." My first response was that I felt that somehow twenty pages in the middle of the article had been lost, but after reading further, I was concerned that this article had been hijacked by one individual with a specific axe to grind, & since this is a topic I know very little about I didn't know just where to start in rewriting this article. Fortunately, Rjensen, you were able to rejuggle the material so that the article no longer is so jarring. Yet about the "Historiographical debates" section, I still don't feel it fits very well, since there is still so little information in this article about how the idea was presented or discussed previous to this "recent research". In other words, this section only provides one side of an ongoing discussion: what are these opinions & interpretations that recent Anglo-American seek to confront & correct? More work needs to be done here, rather than to simply dismiss our concerns by telling us not to "erase high quality material on latest scholarship merely because it deals with the half the people they are uninterested in". -- llywrch (talk) 06:24, 19 December 2010 (UTC)


 * The article ought to mention the wars of religion. The scholars who belonged to the republic of letters crossed religious boundaries and were supposed to respect and tolerate and literally provide hospitality to colleagues of other religions at a time when people were killing each other over such differences. Many, if not all, of the scholars (humanists) had "utopian" hopes that the factions in the religious wars could be reconciled peacefully and a new world could be constructed based on tolerance. There was thus a utopian element built into the republic of letters from the first. The other thing that needs to be brought out is the switch in language in the republic of letters from the Latin of the humanists to French. This permitted membership in the republic to be broadened to include women. I believe these issues are covered in Anthony Grafton's books and recent articles and reviews and those by other people.Mballen (talk) 16:01, 19 February 2011 (UTC)


 * The problem with the article is that it lacks the general context and background-- not that feminine participation in the republic of letters isn't important. Fortunately, this is something that has been written about at length and accessibly just in the last year or so by many scholars, one of the most important of whom is Anthony Grafton, who keeps alive the old spirit of the "Republic" by being very lively, urbane, and accessible.
 * "Anthony Grafton, “A Sketch Map of a Lost Continent: The Republic of Letters.”] in |Mballen] (talk) 18:35, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

Start Point
This article seems to start its detail descriptions a bit late. I've just read 'Between Utopia and Dystopia: Erasmus, Thomas More, and the Humanist Republic of Letters' by Hanan Yoran 2010. Here the Republic of Letters seems to be in full swing in terms of Erasmian Humanism by around 1500. I have a review on Goodreads and other places. He name Erasmus and then Thomas More as the leading Humanists of this phase and marks their achievement as an intellectual discourse that is independent of the powers that be - in Northern Europe the aristocracy. Szczels (talk) 09:07, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

" republec of letters " - John Bulwer's use in Anthropometamorphosis - published 1650
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bulwer#Anthropometamorphosis -

" Until now obeying the sacred impulse of the genius operating upon our intellectual complexion, while my mind was carrying me into new things, I executed works not of supererogation, but supplemental to the advancement of sciences. In which I seem to have merited something from the republec of letters (i.e. Literay public): "Of the making of many books there is no end, and the reading of them is a weariness to the flesh" (Eccles xii.12): From now on I shall apply myself entirly to providing for my own health and the health of others. Other things will be done by other lovers of human nature. THE END "

i.e. John Bulwer clearly expected educated readers to already be familiar with the term ' Republic of Letters ' and yet either he or his publisher took the trouble to make his meaning clear when Anthropometamorphosis was published in 1650 : possibly a significant date to be using the term because of the explosion of pamphlet publishing which took place during the English Civil wars ?DaiSaw (talk) 15:45, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

Trajano Boccalini
I am reading Marc Fumaroli's (almost book length) introductory essay to a French language anthology of La Querelle des anciens et des modernes. Fumaroli locates the beginning of the 17th c. Republic of Letters in the immense European success of Trajano Boccalini's News Bulletins from Parnassus (1612-13), a running satirical commentary on current events as discussed in fictional dialogues between famous writers, ancient and modern, a work which would be be published in many editions and translations. Boccalini's fictional discussions are presided over and judged by Apollo, god of Poetry and Art and the personification, Fumaroli says, of the independent critical spirit of the Republic of Letters, which at one point Fumaroli likens to the invisible Catholic (or catholic) church to which anyone (of any sex, anywhere in time and space) can potentially be a member. According to Fumaroli, Boccalini wrote in pointed criticism of the dangerous political power, under cover of religion, of Spanish and Hapsburg autocracy, which Boccalini saw as a danger to free thought and expression everywhere. Fumaroli says that Boccalini's figure of the god Mercury, Apollo's messenger between Parnassus and earth, is the source of he names of the first 17th c. periodicals addressed to the independent reading public, Mercure galant, Mercure de France, etc.

Marc Fumaroli is also the author of La République des lettres (2015?) reviewed in the July 2015 issue of the New York Review of Books. See  http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2015/07/09/marc-fumaroli-passionate-master/ Doesn't seem to have been translated yet. Mballen (talk) 16:49, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

See also | Antonella Ciccarelli, "Traiano Boccalini: la ragion di stato tra satira e sinceritas. Quale accettabilità per Machiavelli?"
 * ABSTRACT
 * "News Sheets from Parnassus (Venice 1612–1613) by Traiano Boccalini is a political satire which criticizes in allegorical language the Machiavellian origins of the imperialism, supported by the Counter Reformation papacy, of Philip II of Spain. As an admirer of Erasmus and the Catholic irenics born of the Protestant Reformation, Boccalini stages, in a utopian city state set on Mount Parnassus, an intense dialogue between the various souls who make up the Literary Republic in order to redeem politics by putting it back on an ethical basis. While Boccalini's News Sheets addresses the Problem of the State in the form of a fictional satire inspired by [Greek writer] Lucian of Samosata, his Observations on the Annals and the Agricola of Cornelius Tacitus is a traditional political treatise on the best form of government. In it Boccalini takes the Republic of Venice as the perfect model of the state within the tradition of Venetian anti-Machiavellianism. Boccalini's focus on the ethical dimension of politics makes him one the foremost critics among scholars writing about 'Reasons of State.' The codes of behavior stated in their works are laid bare by Boccalini’s satire as the reason for the hypocrisy practiced by sovereigns, for the dominant moral corruption of modern society, and for the blindness of peoples unable to grasp the wicked principles underlying obedience to political power." Mballen (talk) 16:49, 19 October 2016 (UTC) [lightly edited ] Mballen (talk) 17:06, 19 October 2016 (UTC) Mballen (talk) 17:50, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

Article tone
The whole tone of the article is very general and vague, with few sources. It does not deal with the specifics of the topic and then there is a giant piece on the historiography which is about twice as long as the rest of the article combined and goes into many nuances and obscurities that are unwarranted in a short general introduction. I see from the comments this has been a problem since 2010, I don't have the expertise to fix the article but I dunno, maybe someone will see this in some 'latest discussion' section somewhere. - 80.111.159.148 (talk) 16:56, 26 May 2017 (UTC)

Time frame
The English article mentions the late 17th century as a starting point, whereas the French article mentions the Renaissance period as that of the blooming of the Republic of Letters. Either there is a contradiction, or the period when it flourished was not the same on both sides of the Channel and then of the Atlantic. Baronnet (talk) 14:47, 19 June 2024 (UTC)