The full official title of L’Encyclopédie is L’Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des
métiers, translated to “The Encyclopedia, or Classified Dictionary of Sciences,
Arts, and Trades” (Britannica). It consists
of 28 books, 17 of which are volumes. The remaining 11 books, called plates,
contain illustrations and graphics that correspond to the volumes. Throughout
this semester, I plan to begin with Volume 1 and continue through the volumes
as far as I can.
The first volume contains all of
the entries that begin with “A” – there are so many “A” entries that it took up
the entire book! I suspect that common letters like “A” will have their own
volumes, while other less popular letters will share with their neighboring
letters. Who knew that encyclopedia publishing was a popularity contest?
The first entry in the first volume
of L’Encyclopédie is simply the
letter “A”, “the character or figure of the first letter of the Alphabet in
Latin, French, and in almost all of the languages of Europe” (3). The very last
entry of the first volume is “Azymites”, or “the name that the schismatic
Greeks give to the Roman Catholics”(914). So, as a reference, there are a total
of 911 pages worth of entries in the first volume, and there are 16 volumes
that follow. I repeat: there is an incredible
amount of information contained in this work. I have included pictures of both the first (page 3) and last (page 914) entry pages of the first volume.
An introduction to the project is included
at the beginning of this volume, titled “Discours préliminaire des éditeurs” (Preface
from the editors). It is quite long – 45 large encyclopedia pages, to be exact.
Nonetheless, as one might expect, it is fundamental to the work as a whole.
Diderot and d’Alembert (the latter of whom is the principle author of this
preface) set the tone for their writing and explain the nature of the project
in this section. The University of Michigan hosted a collaborative translation
project of
L’Encyclopédie in which a
team of academics and student assistants translated the entirety of the work
from French into English. The project’s scholars call the Discours préliminaire
“incomparably the best introduction to the French enlightenment.” In doing my
own reading of the work, I appreciate this assessment of the preface, and if I
were more qualified to make such a comment, I would probably agree. The
Enlightenment was characterized by the organization and advancement of human
knowledge and learning; the preface and
L’Encyclopédie
as a whole most definitely lend themselves to these tendencies. The
University of Michigan article about the Preface in addition to the translation
project itself can be found
here and
here, respectively.
I found that the Watkinson also has
an English translation of the plan of
L’Encyclopédie,
published shortly after the work itself, called
The Plan of the French Encyclopedia, in which this preface is
included (of course, I could have read the University of Michigan translation,
but reading a three-hundred-year-old book is much more fun). Upon comparing
what I read in French and its English translation, I found that the two
versions say slightly different things. For the most part, the gist is the
same, but a budding philologist like myself would find such differences
noteworthy. My principal observation is that the French version seems more
proper than its English counterpart. I attribute this to two factors: first,
French tends to be a formal language, and historically, the French have been
pickier about use and preservation of their language (that’s why they
established
L’Académie Française). Second, I speak better English than I
do French, so it is possible that complex words and phrasing I use in English
may be more familiar to me than they are in French. Either way, I found that
the French manuscript seems to say essentially the same thing in a fancier way
and in more words than the English one.
In terms of
content, the authors present their own qualifications for undertaking the task
of compiling this work as well as what they intend to include in its volumes.
The opening sentence states that they, the authors, are presenting this work to
the public as “L’Ouvrage d’une société de Gens de Lettres,” or a publication of
a “learned body.” With this, Diderot and d’Alembert begin to address an
important critique of the work: “how is it possible that two persons can be
[qualified] to treat all of the arts and sciences?” They reassure readers that
“this is not the work of a single hand or two,” but will have many contributors
from this “learned body” (see
this list of contributing authors). The work will embrace two perspectives: first, as an encyclopedia, and second,
as a philosophical dictionary. As an encyclopedia, the work will demonstrate
the connections between and organization of all human knowledge and
disciplines. The Philosophical Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Trades will
explore the base principles and essential details of each science and art in
human existence.
My next post will concern the
authors’ division of knowledge, which is a very integral part of the work and
its context, so it deserves its own post.
Stay tuned and bon weekend!
Christina
As mentioned in previous posts, planches are the 11 volumes of plates
and drawings that accompany the 17 volumes of text, making for 28 total books
that make up L’Encyclopédie. The
benefit of the planches is obvious:
visual aids help readers understand and conceptualize ideas better. Naturally,
not every topic in the text has an accompanying planche drawing – it would be difficult to draw the soul, wouldn’t
it? The depictions included are those of material things, especially lots of
industrial machinery and the like. As is the case with the text of L’Encyclopédie, you can find a drawing
of pretty much anything, though. I flipped open to a page in the middle of the
book and found pages and pages of architectural drawings of elaborate buildings
and homes. Then, a few pages later, I found drawings of Art Militaire, or the Art of Military. Often included with the
drawings are short descriptions of what is being depicted and sometimes, when
applicable, instructions for its use. This particular book of planches (the first in the series) has
269 drawings. The first drawings are of agriculture, including everything from
drawings of people doing agriculture to drawings of the machines used. The planche concludes with drawings of artificier, or pyrotechnics, included in
the military section of this planche. The photo included above is of the table of contents which, as you can see, is quite extensive and detailed.
