Montesquieu

Course Description

Charles-Louis de Secondat, baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu, author of De l’Esprit des lois, a seminal early French Enlightenment text still considered today a fundamental work of political science and philosophy. Montesquieu was judged by the 2nd generation of the Enlightenment and the Encyclopédistes to be their intellectual patron saint, grounding the epistemological, aesthetic and political programs for his age. This course will read his most important texts, political, literary and physiological, in order to situate Montesquieu’s presence in the Enlightenment and to consider his enduring impact on later thinkers and writers. Works to be considered will include his early texts on gland theory, Les lettres persanes, Considérations sur les causes de la grandeur des Romains et de leur décadence, de l’Esprit des lois, extracts from his Spicilèges, texts of and around the Encyclopédie, and short texts from some of Montesquieu’s most important readers: Condorcet, Napoléon Bonaparte, Tocqueville, etc. Readings in French, course taught in English.

Code

AS.212.717

Credits

3

Subject

Modern Languages & Literatures