Republic of Letters [ National & Transnational cultures / Reading & Writing ]
… and Madame du Deffand maintained active communication by writing letters to their vast numbers of acquaintances in an exchange of news and ideas. The idea of a ‘Res Publica Litteraria’ dates back to antiquity, and was also alive and well … their identity as intellectuals. This notion of a scholarly community in communication, created by and nourished by the exchange of letters, could not truly flourish in scale and scope until the significant improvements to the postal system … explosion of letters,’ where correspondences which used to number in the dozens or hundreds grow to thousands of letters exchanged ( Edelstein et al. 412) . Correspondence was the defining feature of the Republic of Letters and the primary …
Academies | Censorship | Community | Correspondence | Cosmopolitanism | Networks | Republic of Letters
Encyclopedia