Narratives of Enlightenment: Cosmopolitan History from Voltaire to Gibbon (Cambridge Studies in Eighteenth-Century English Literature and Thought, Series Number 34)

Narratives of Enlightenment is an interdisciplinary study of cosmopolitan approaches to the past. It reappraises the work of five of the most important narrative historians of the century - Voltaire, David Hume, William Robertson, Edward Gibbon and the historian of the American Revolution, David Ramsay - in the context of political and national debates in France, Scotland, England and America; and it investigates the nature and degree of their intellectual investment in the idea of a common European civilisation. Karen O'Brien combines the methodologies of literary criticism and intellectual history to explore debates about Enlightenments and the political uses of narrative. Where previous studies have emphasised the growth of nationalism in eighteenth-century literature, she reveals the development of cosmopolitan ways of thinking beyond national cultural issues. Is there a common European identity? If so, what kinds of history does it possess? Narratives of Enlightenment examines the literary and historical achievements of major figures such as Voltaire, David Hume, William Robertson, Edward Gibbon and the American historian David Ramsay in the light of eighteenth-century political and national debates in France, Scotland, England and America. Undertaking a comparative reappraisal of these writers, Karen O'Brien investigates the degree and nature of their intellectual investments in the idea of a common European civilisation. This original and incisive study intervenes from the perspective of literary criticism in contemporary debates about Enlightenments past and present, the political uses for narrative, and the European contexts of national awareness. Narratives of Enlightenment reappraises the work of five of the most important narrative historians of the eighteenth century--Voltaire, David Hume, William Robertson, Edward Gibbon, and the historian of the American Revolution, David Ramsay--in the context of political and national debates in France, Scotland, England and America. Where previous studies have emphasized the growth of nationalism in eighteenth-century literature, Karen O'Brien reveals the development of cosmopolitan ways of thinking beyond national cultural issues. Narratives of Enlightenment reappraises the work of five of the most important narrative historians of the eighteenth century - Voltaire, David Hume, William Robertson, Edward Gibbon, and the historian of the American Revolution, David Ramsay - and reveals the development of cosmopolitan ways of thinking beyond national issues. This is a study of cosmopolitan approaches to the past in the work of five eighteenth-century historians, and it is concerned with their endeavours to modify or transform their readers' sense of national self-awareness through the writing of narrative history.

a Reappraisal Of The Work Of Five Major Narrative Historians (voltaire, Hume, Robertson, Gibbon And Ramsay) In Eighteenth-century Europe And America.