The Marquis De Sade As A Key Figure Of Enlightenment

The Marquis de Sade as a Key Figure of Enlightenment: How His Crystal Genius Still Speaks to Today's World and Its Major Problems discusses how the Marquis de Sade (1740-1814) stretched the dimensions of reputation and notoriety nearly obscuring his mastery in literature and philosophy while braving the Ancien Régime and Revolutionary France's «age of iron [hell]» with unheard-of determination to be read and taken seriously as not just a writer and a contributing citizen but as an engaged educator, a committed philosopher, and an uncompromisingly fierce moralist. Sade has been a strange combination of what society dreads and what it needs most for its salvation: mature enlightenment that is not afraid to see and face real problems so that there can be solutions. This book stresses how the literary and intellectual public needs to reconnect with the moral gems of this demon(ized) man, nowadays more so than ever, to explain our most critical issues and to reiterate the long-standing solutions Sade professed from the 1780s through the early nineteenth century. This work not only reestablishes the creative, literary, and intellectual Sade, it critically stages and highlights the philosophical Marquis as a world citizen trapped between theories of social classes and a loose-fitting messianism. It is evident throughout the work how Sade's deep concerns for humanity flatly contradict the popular rhetoric (of wickedness and perversion) recycled and amplified since his first writing days. The Marquis de Sade as a Key Figure of Enlightenment offers a new perspective on this complex writer and on the intimate workings of our human world. It is a valuable resource for courses on French literature, eighteenth-century studies, the Enlightenment, literary criticism, and gender and sexuality studies.

This book connects the philosophy of the Marquis de Sade—one of the most notorious, iconic, and yet poorly-understood figures within the history of European thought—with the broader themes of the Enlightenment. Rather than seeing himself as a mere pornographer, Sade understood himself as continuing the progressive tradition of French Enlightenment philosophy. Sade aspired to be a philosophe. This book uses intellectual history and the history of philosophy to reconstruct Sade’s philosophical ‘system’ and its historical context. Within the period’s discourse of sensibility Sade draws on the philosophical and the literary to form a relatively sophisticated ‘system’ which he deploys to critically engage with the two major strands of eighteenth-century ethical theory: the moral sense and natural law traditions. This work is of interest to: ‘Continental’ Philosophy, Critical Theory, French Studies, the History of Eighteenth-Century Philosophy, Literary Studies, the History of Moral Philosophy, and Enlightenment Studies.

Revered by Enlightenment and Victorian thinkers, de Sade was recognized as a founding father by the Surrealists, and holds a prominent place in the history of modernism and post-modernism. This selection of his early writings, some appearing in English translation for the first time, revealsthe full range of his sobering moods and considerable talents.

The Enlightenment Movement changed society forever, driving it forward through new and fresh ways of thinking about science, religion, history, politics, and culture. This dictionary offers a balanced overview and helps us to understand and appreciate the Enlightenment through its coverage of the basic assumptions and values that structured the movement; explanation of how these ideas were articulated; the paths of communication they followed; how its key ideas grew, developed and were refracted; and how new problems grew out of what were advanced as solutions to older problems. An engaging introductory essay along with hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries defines the significant persons, places, events, institutions, and literary works of the movement. A chronological table charts the progression of the movement by indicating the date, the main figures involved, the political or society events, and the science, arts, or letters that resulted. The comprehensive bibliography, with an introductory essay to the literature, categorized by subject complements this reference that will be valued by all seeking basic details about this important period.

Philosophy in the Bedroom Marquis De Sade - Philosophy in the Bedroom is a 1795 book by the Marquis de Sade written in the form of a dramatic dialogue. Though initially considered a work of pornography, the book has come to be considered a socio-political drama. Set in a bedroom, the seven dialogues concern Eugenie, a virgin, who has been sent to the house of Madame de Saint-Ange by her father, to be instructed in the ways of the libertine. Along with Le Chevalier de Mirval, (Madame de Saint-Ange's 20-year-old brother), and Dolmancé, a 36-year-old atheist and bisexual, they all teach her their ways. When her mother shows up, she is punished for bringing her daughter up with 'false virtues'.

Discussing the 'real' Marquis de Sade from his mythical and demonic reputation, John Phillips examines Sade's life and work his libertine novels, his championing of atheism, and his uniqueness in bringing the body and sex back into philosophy.