Robert Darnton

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Robert Darnton 2006

Robert Choate Darnton (born May 10, 1939 in New York City ) is an American historian .

He is considered one of the outstanding historians of ideas of the past decades. Since July 2007 he has been Carl H. Pforzheimer Professor at Harvard and headed the university library there until 2016. He is one of the founding fathers of the so-called “ cultural turn ”, the New Cultural History , which has shaped historical studies since the late 1980s. Darnton's main focus is on what is “foreign” to earlier cultures and mentalities. His books and essays on pre-revolutionary France challenged the traditional view of the Enlightenment . He is considered the most important academic author in relation to Diderot's Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers.

In contrast to the classic history of ideas , Darnton is less concerned with who thought something first than with how these ideas spread in society ; how they influenced public opinion , how they found their way into general communication . He is therefore less concerned with the creation of important works than with distribution, their acceptance and their readers. In contrast to the media history that had prevailed up to then, Darnton did not concentrate solely on technical production, but also included a broad field of political history (especially censorship ), art history and economic theory of the market .

Life

Darnton lost his father early in New Guinea during World War II . He studied American history and American literature at Harvard University , and European history at the University of Oxford . He received his doctorate in 1964. The resulting book on Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment was translated into five languages. Darnton publishes in English, French and German; most of his books are also translated into Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese and Chinese.

Darnton briefly worked as a reporter for the New York Times before accepting a fellowship at Harvard and becoming a professor at Princeton University in 1968 . He was visiting professor at the University of Oxford, the University of Warwick , the Collège de France , the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales and the École normal supérieure in Paris .

Darnton with Hans Tuzzi at the Festivaletteratura in Mantua 2018.

He spent 1989 and 1990 at the Wissenschaftskolleg , where he witnessed the fall of the Berlin Wall and the fall of the Berlin Wall . The subsequently published records from this period are his only work that is not with the cultural history in France of the 18th century busy.

Darnton was President of the Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies from 1987 to 1991 and President of the American Historical Association in 1999 . He is an officer of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres , Knight of the Legion of Honor and holder of four honorary doctorates . In 1980 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and in 1989 to the American Philosophical Society . He has been an external member of the Academia Europaea since 1994 .

Darnton's view of the Enlightenment

General

Robert Darnton's work would be unthinkable without the discovery of the dossiers and correspondence (over 50,000 letters) of the Société typographique de Neuchâtel (STN). The Société typographique was a large publishing house on the other side of the French border that supplied the kingdom with pirated prints and banned books in the 18th century. This discovery of sources enabled Darnton to take a microscopic look into the lowlands of the French Enlightenment with the help of Paris archives - a look that brought out much that was alien. This stranger, which challenged the traditional view of the Enlightenment and the desire to understand it, is Darnton's research focus to this day.

Mesmerism (1968)

Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment in France

In his mesmerism book Darnton tries to explore the mentality of educated French on the eve of the French Revolution . According to Darnton, Paris society during this period was not as preoccupied with politics and political theory as one would expect, but with sensational scientific discoveries, breathtaking balloon flights, and mesmerism - the biggest trend in the last decade of the Ancien Régime.

Franz Anton Mesmer came to the French capital in 1778 and cast a spell over it like no other. His theory of a fluid that permeates all bodies and that can be brought into harmony with nature by massaging found many followers. According to his own admission, he healed countless sick people in group sessions. However, this practice brought Mesmer into conflict with the Parisian medical community and academy, which questioned his teaching. Here the social explosive of mesmerism shows itself: Mesmer's apolitical theory became a political issue.

Mesmer's followers included educated aristocrats, clerics and merchants as well as some later revolutionaries, young frustrated writers such as J.-P. Brissot , J.-L. Carra and Nicolas Bergasse , drawn to Mesmer's struggle against the academic establishment. In 1785 the radical wing of the mesmerist movement split off. The radicals around Nicolas Bergasse, who was previously Mesmer's representative and mouthpiece, founded their own group and focused more on the political implications of mesmerism, which they merged with Rousseau's teaching. In the following years, they intensified their struggle against the institutions ruled by the nobility with pamphlets. Because: in their eyes, the so-called republic of scholars was in truth the greatest tyranny, since the academy had nipped their careers as writers and natural philosophers in the bud. In Mesmer's struggle against the medical profession, they saw a model for their very personal struggle, which culminated in the revolution in 1789.

The High Enlightenment (1971)

The High Enlightenment and the Low-Life of Literature in Prerevolutionary France

In his essay The High Enlightenment and the Low-Life of Literature Darnton shows that before the French Revolution there was no conflict between the “ philosophes ” (including Voltaire , d'Alembert , Diderot) and the elites (nobility and clergy) of the ancien regime . Rather, the “ philosophes ” were absorbed by the “ monde ” and received impressive pensions. Works that are critical of the system, such as Rousseau's “ Contrat Social ”, were read, if at all, by the nobility and clergy. They could not really kindle a revolutionary fire among the citizens. Attracted by the economic success of the " philosophes ", young writers from the provinces tried their luck in Paris in the following years. But this second generation had a harder time. Few benefited from government support ( Jean-François Marmontel , Jean Baptiste Antoine Suard ). Many felt disappointed in their hope. They lived meagerly in attic rooms and wrote in pamphlets (" libelles ") all their frustration from the soul. These radical “ libelles ” scrutinized the immoral goings-on in the “ monde ” in a hearty, clear language . This language was also understood by the lower classes. The pamphlets were passed on in hand. The loss of moral integrity hit the ancien regime far more severely than the state-theoretical treatises of Montesquieu and Rousseau . After the outbreak of the French Revolution, the authors of the " libelles " played a prominent role ( Jean Paul Marat , Jacques Pierre Brissot ).

The Business of Enlightenment (1979)

Shiny Shops / The Business of Enlightenment. A Publishing History of the Encyclopédie 1775-1800

The Business of Enlightenment is already one of the classics of modern history. The main topic of the book is the spread of the Enlightenment in pre-revolutionary France, the main subject of the encyclopedia , its new editions and revisions. Darnton emphasizes that for the main players - publishers, booksellers and also the writing philosophers - the education was essentially big business. The ideas spread were often of secondary importance.

After the printing and distribution of the first, expensive folio editions were rather dangerous and unprofitable, with the accession of Louis XVI. 1774 and the relaxation of censorship opened up the possibility of large-scale speculation. Finally, the encyclopedia should also be affordable for a wider audience. To this end, after some back and forth, three main shareholders came together in 1777: Charles-Joseph Panckoucke from Paris, the most powerful bookseller of his time and owner of the privilege to distribute the encyclopedia; Joseph Duplain of Lyon, a shrewd bookseller who specialized in pirated prints and who wanted to stab Panckoucke in the back with an illegal fourth reprint of the encyclopedia; the Société typographique de Neuchâtel (STN), a printing and publishing house across the border specializing in illegal literature and recently co-owner of the privilege. Duplain took over the operative business. The work was mainly printed in Lyon and Geneva. The STN only got a few volumes to print and growled. Likewise the "philosopher" Suard, member of the academy. Panckoucke's plan was to prepare a revised edition of the encyclopedia for a reasonable fee.

After the announcement of the Quart edition, a real encyclopedia fever broke out. Over 8,000 subscriptions were received and Duplain, the printing works and the suppliers (paper mills, type foundry) could not keep up with their production. In the next few years a guerrilla war developed between the shareholders. Especially Duplain tricked where possible and tried to get as much profit as possible for himself - if necessary to the detriment of his partners. Despite all the quarrels, the Quart edition ultimately paid off for all shareholders.

The fourth edition of the encyclopedia was v. a. subscribed by the traditional elite of the ancien régime, by lawyers and administrators, by clerics and the nobility. Dealers and entrepreneurs were hardly interested in the plant, and craftsmen still couldn't afford it. So it is not surprising that the encyclopedia was mainly sold in cities with parlement, academy and garrison: Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux, Languedoc, Provence, Bourgogne, Franche-Comté and Normandy. It was the upper social classes of the ancien régime who in the years before the revolution more and more adopted and lived the Enlightenment ideas.

After the successful marketing of the Quart edition, Panckoucke concentrated entirely on the “Encyclopédie Méthodique”, a monumental work that by 1832 had grown to around 200 volumes. It was to be his masterpiece in publishing. But after a few years production stalled before, like the entire book market with the exception of the revolutionary journals, it collapsed to a minimum in the turmoil of the revolution. In addition, Panckoucke was sharply attacked by the left, revolutionary press (including von Brissot , Carra ) and accused of counterrevolution because he adopted a conservative tone in his long-standing monopoly magazines "Mercure" and "Gazette de France". His connections to the highest positions in the ancien régime became more and more of a problem, such as the relationship with the Paris police chief Lenoir. Panckoucke's star began to decline. The proclamation of the freedom of the press in July 1789 also destroyed the old system of privileges and protection and thus the basis of Panckoucke's book trade empire.

The Business of Enlightenment is the first, micro-historically oriented part of Darnton's trilogy on intellectuals, books and public opinion in the 18th century. The second, more general part, the v. a. the extent of illegal book production came into focus, followed in 1995 with The Forbidden Best-Sellers of Prerevolutionary France and The Corpus of Clandestine Literature . The third part is dedicated to the pamphlets ("libelles") circulating in revolutionary Paris and was published in 2009 under the title The Devil in the Holy Water . Preliminary work can be found in Public Opinion and George Washington's False Teeth .

The Great Cat Massacre (1984)

Workers rehearse the uprising
The Great Cat Massacre of the Rue Saint-Séverin / Workers Revolt: The Great Cat Massacre of the Rue Saint-Séverin

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Darnton held history classes at Princeton University with the anthropologist Clifford Geertz . The result of these seminars was “The Great Cat Massacre”, a collection of essays that deals far more than his earlier works with the folk culture of the Enlightenment, which is alien to us today.

In the essay of the same name, Darnton tells of the wage workers in a Parisian printing company who revolted against the daily humiliations of their master around 1740. After the workers robbed him of sleep by imitating meowing in front of the window, the master personally commissioned them to put an end to the cats' activity. In spite of the express prohibition, the apprentices and journeymen first killed the master's favorite cat, before they tried and hanged the other cats that were caught, amid harsh laughter. Darnton sees the attack on the favorite cat as an indirect attack on the master and thus on the rulership; after all, in the early modern period a house cat was identified directly with its owner. Due to the high popular symbolism of the cat (witchcraft, sexuality), the master was also branded as a witch and accused of being on the side. This successful coup - a rebellion against the rulers that could not be punished - was theatrically re-enacted several times by the apprentices in the workshop ("copie") and served as a social outlet.

In the essay Darnton uses a dense description based on Clifford Geertz.

Works

  • Mesmerism and the End of Enlightenment in France , Cambridge (Mass.) / London, Harvard University Press, London 1968.
    • German: Mesmerism and the end of the Enlightenment in France , translated from English and French and provided with an essay by Martin Blankenburg, Hanser, Munich 1983, ISBN 3-446-13422-0 .
  • 1979: The Business of Enlightenment. A Publishing History of the Encyclopédie, 1775-1800 , Cambridge (Mass.) / London, HUP.
    • German: Shiny shops. The Diffusion of Diderot's Encyclopedia or: How to Sell Knowledge for a Profit? , Berlin, Wagenbach 1993 (abbreviated), ISBN 3-8031-3568-0 .
  • 1982: The Literary Underground of the Old Regime , Cambridge (Mass.) / London, HUP.
    • German: literati in the underground. Reading, writing and publishing in pre-revolutionary France , Munich, Hanser 1985.
  • The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History , Basic Books, New York 1984; Vintage Books, New York 1985, ISBN 3-446-13422-0 .
    • German: The great cat massacre. Forays into French culture before the revolution. , Hanser, Munich, 1989, ISBN 3-446-14158-8 .
  • 1990: The Kiss of Lamourette. Reflections in Cultural History , New York, Norton.
    • German: The kiss of Lamourette . Cultural-historical considerations , Hanser, Munich 1998.
  • 1991: Berlin Journal 1989-1990 , New York, Norton.
    • German: The last dance on the wall. Berliner Journal 1989-1990 , Hanser, Munich 1991.
  • 1995 The Forbidden Best-Sellers of Prerevolutionary France , New York, Norton (no German edition).
  • 1995: The Corpus of Clandestine Literature in France, 1769-1789 , New York, Norton (no German edition).
  • 1996: Thinking Lust , Frankfurt, Eichborn, The Other Library series
  • 1997: George Washington's False Teeth, or Again: What is Enlightenment? Essay. CH Beck, Munich ISBN 3-406-42367-1 .
  • 2000: Public Opinion and Communication Networks in Eighteenth-Century Paris , in: Knabe, Peter Eckhard (ed.) Opinion , Berlin.
    • German: poetry and police. Public opinion and communication networks in Paris in the 18th century , Frankfurt, Suhrkamp 2002.
  • 2001: J.-P. Brissot and the Société Typographique de Neuchatel (1779-1787) , in: Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century 10 (2001) , Oxford.
  • 2001: J.-P. Brissot. His Career and Correspondence (1779-1787) , Oxford, E-Book: www.voltaire.ox.ac.uk.
  • 2003: The Science of Piracy. A central element in the publishing industry of the 18th century , Munich, Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung (Topics Vol. 77).
  • 2003: George Washington's false teeth. An Unconventional Guide to the Eighteenth Century , New York / London, Norton.
  • 2009: The Devil in the Holy Water, or the Art of Slander from Louis XIV to Napoleon , Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press.

literature

  • Charles Walton (Ed.): Into Print: Limits and Legacies of the Enlightenment - Essays in Honor of Robert Darnton. Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park 2011, ISBN 978-0-271-05012-6 .
  • 1998: Mason, Haydn T. (ed.): The Darnton debate. Books and revolution in the eighteenth century , Oxford, The Alden Press (= Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century 359 (1998)).

Prices

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Robert Darnton: The great cat massacre. Forays into French culture before the revolution . Carl Hanser, Munich 1989, p. 109 .
  2. ↑ Robert Darnton: The great cat massacre. Forays into French culture before the revolution. Carl Hanser, Munich 1989, p. 93 .
  3. ↑ Hacke, Jens / Pohlig, Matthias (ed.): Theory in historical science: Insights into the practice of historical research . Campus, Frankfurt / Main 2008, p. 87 .
personal data
SURNAME Darnton, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Choate Darnton, Robert Choate
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American historian
DATE OF BIRTH May 10, 1939
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City , USA