Persian Letters

by Montesquieu, George R. Healy (Translator)

Overview

Based on the 1758 edition, this translation strives for fidelity and retains Montesquieu's paragraphing. George R. Healy's Introduction discusses The Persian Letters as a kind of overture to the Enlightenment, a work of remarkable diversity designed more to explore a problem of great urgency for eighteenth century thought than to resolve it: that of discovering universals, or at least the pragmatic constants, amid the diversity of human culture and society, and of confronting the proposition that there are no values in human relationships except those imposed by force or agreed upon in self-interested conventions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780872204904
Publisher:	Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
Publication date:	09/01/1999
Series:	Hackett Classics Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

Andrew Kahn is University Lecturer in Russian at Oxford University.
Margaret Mauldon is the distinguished translator of Flaubert's Madame Bovary, Diderot's Rameau's Nephew, and other works.

Editorial Reviews

<:st>A translation of the 1758 edition of the French writer's witty, naughty, and negative critique of his society. In addition to one character's irreverent observations on popes and kings, and the expressions of frustration another's wives and eunuchs, however, are essays and allegories exploring the 18th-century urgency to discover universals, or at least pragmatic constants amid the diversity of human cultural and society, and to confront the proposition that all human relationships are based on self-interest. Healy provides a 19- page introduction and footnotes explaining allusions. Paper edition (unseen), $9.95. Cited in . Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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