The art of thinking freely is apparently to publish your stuff anonymously, to ghost-write, and to not publish most of your stuff at all during your lifetime. Diderot was pinning a lot on posterity appreciating him; he even wrote notes in the papers he left behind directly addressing us. "O Posterity, my own times were so oppressive, but I just know you're going to appreciate me, please appreciate me! It's my last chance to believe I accomplished something with all my work."
After seeing what kinds of things he wrote, you begin to understand why secrecy was so important. But before we dive in, a little more personal background.
Diderot was influenced by Voltaire's description of English thinkers, taught himself English (apparently by studying a Latin-English dictionary!), and started to read Locke, Bacon, Newton, and the like himself. He gradually, unlike Voltaire, became an atheist.
Meanwhile, Diderot's younger brother, Didier-Pierre, decides to become as pious as his older, prodigal brother Denis is blasphemous. He actually becomes a priest, and is outspoken in his disapproval of Denis. The disapproval is mutual. During one of their conflicts later in life, Denis will write to his younger priestly brother, telling that he should imagine himself on his deathbed and look back on his life, and “you will see that you are a bad priest, a bad citizen, a bad son, a bad brother, a bad uncle, and an evil man.”
Tell us how you really feel, Diderot.
Oh, and Denis dedicates his first work, a translation of an English freethinker, to his brother, in an amazing act of fraternal passive-aggressiveness that Heinrich would appreciate.
So after publishing some unorthodox works, our Diderot ends up in prison. (Not the Bastille; it was full. The Vincennes, where the Marquis de Sade also did some time, many years later.)
At first, he denies all the charges. Then, after a few weeks, his jailer hints that he could be here for years, and winter is coming.
After an attempt to hold out, Diderot finally confesses and agrees not to do it again. He also promises to dedicate the upcoming Encyclopédie to d'Argenson, the really prominent politician who was the reason he was in prison. He's eventually released, after a few months in prison. Incidentally, the book tells me the governor of the prison was the Marquis du Châtelet. The year? 1749, the year of Émilie's death.
Having learned his lesson, he will be more cautious about what he publishes and attaches his name to, but will write incredibly prolificly (Curren keeps using the word "workhorse") and espouse such popular [irony alert] opinions as:
Theater: Classical French theater, you know, the Racine and Corneille kind that Voltaire is still producing, is overly affected, codified, and unnatural. Instead of stereotypes like "lover" and "domineering father", we need realistic, three-dimensional characters. Also working-class heroes.
During my one and only in-person meeting with Voltaire, shortly before he dies, we will argue about Shakespeare. I will [quoting the biography here] compare Shakespeare to the massive fifteenth-century statue of Saint Christopher that stood just outside the doors leading into Notre Dame Cathedral. While perhaps crude and rustic, this colossus was very much like Shakespeare...because "the greatest men still walk through his legs without the top of their head touching his testicles."
In case it's not clear, that means you and your stupid old-fashioned plays, Voltaire!
This meeting: *remains the only in-person encounter between Voltaire and Diderot, though the correspondence continues to be argumentatively friendly*
Sex: Incest, bestiality, and homosexuality are "natural", not sins. I myself experienced homoerotic attraction on at least one or two occasions, though I evidently never acted on it. No evidence I had any personal affinity for incest and bestiality, but I will definitely write unpublished fanfic where these things are presented positively. Also, free love, free love is cool!
Slavery: Go, future revolting slaves! Rise up and throw off your chains! (It's argued that Toussaint Louverture, leader of the Haitian revolution just a few years after Diderot's death, read the anti-slavery book that Diderot co-authored.)
Regicide: Sometimes called for. Will of the people and all that. Go future French revolutionaries, who will totally disclaim any association with me and treat my memory like shit after my death! [Reason: he was too freethinking even for them, especially the atheism.]
Colonialism: Omg, the LITERAL WORST. All Europe is complicit, not just slave-traders and merchants! STOP IT.
American Revolution: If you guys just left off with the BLATANT HYPOCRISY of espousing freedom while owning massive slave plantations, you'd be the literal best. Wish I weren't too old to travel there! Good luck! Come visit me! (He may have met Franklin in person, we're not sure, but they definitely had a mutual friend and knew of each other.)
Education: Forget Greek and Latin, we need to educate the majority of the population so that they know what their rights are and will defend them against tyranny.
Louis XVI: The French Revolution is coming. Joseph's not the only one who can see the writing on the wall. You [tu] need to fix everything right now, or else you're going to go down in history as a do-nothing tyrant. (Yes, he tu-ed King Louis in an actualfax published work that Louis got to read or at least hear about before banning.)
God: What God? Pure materialism, yeah! I myself will turn down a meeting with Voltaire when he's famous and I'm still an up-and-coming young man, because I feel like he's going to use the opportunity to try to convert me to deism. But we'll definitely argue about the existence of a deity by letter!
Seneca: 18C contemporaries, I know you all think Seneca was the worst, because he was a blatant hypocrite about being a luxury-rejecting Stoic while accumulating a fortune and cozying up to Nero, but here's several hundred pages about how he was the best, and sometimes you have to cozy up to tyrants to get anything done, even though it's questionable that we got anything done with our respective tyrants. (Seneca had more influence initially, but then he had to commit suicide. Diderot had no influence ever, but at least didn't have to commit suicide.)
Yeah, one of these things is not like the others. More on Diderot and tyrants later!
Diderot: Notice how I only got imprisoned for my first couple of works, and I spent my whole subsequent life in France happily churning out prodigious amounts of controversial work without ever getting imprisoned or exiled again. Beat that, Voltaire!
Voltaire: Notice how no one ever accused me of being conflict-averse.
Diderot: The Art of Thinking Freely
After seeing what kinds of things he wrote, you begin to understand why secrecy was so important. But before we dive in, a little more personal background.
Diderot was influenced by Voltaire's description of English thinkers, taught himself English (apparently by studying a Latin-English dictionary!), and started to read Locke, Bacon, Newton, and the like himself. He gradually, unlike Voltaire, became an atheist.
Meanwhile, Diderot's younger brother, Didier-Pierre, decides to become as pious as his older, prodigal brother Denis is blasphemous. He actually becomes a priest, and is outspoken in his disapproval of Denis. The disapproval is mutual. During one of their conflicts later in life, Denis will write to his younger priestly brother, telling that he should imagine himself on his deathbed and look back on his life, and “you will see that you are a bad priest, a bad citizen, a bad son, a bad brother, a bad uncle, and an evil man.”
Tell us how you really feel, Diderot.
Oh, and Denis dedicates his first work, a translation of an English freethinker, to his brother, in an amazing act of fraternal passive-aggressiveness that Heinrich would appreciate.
So after publishing some unorthodox works, our Diderot ends up in prison. (Not the Bastille; it was full. The Vincennes, where the Marquis de Sade also did some time, many years later.)
At first, he denies all the charges. Then, after a few weeks, his jailer hints that he could be here for years, and winter is coming.
After an attempt to hold out, Diderot finally confesses and agrees not to do it again. He also promises to dedicate the upcoming Encyclopédie to d'Argenson, the really prominent politician who was the reason he was in prison. He's eventually released, after a few months in prison. Incidentally, the book tells me the governor of the prison was the Marquis du Châtelet. The year? 1749, the year of Émilie's death.
Having learned his lesson, he will be more cautious about what he publishes and attaches his name to, but will write incredibly prolificly (Curren keeps using the word "workhorse") and espouse such popular [irony alert] opinions as:
Theater: Classical French theater, you know, the Racine and Corneille kind that Voltaire is still producing, is overly affected, codified, and unnatural. Instead of stereotypes like "lover" and "domineering father", we need realistic, three-dimensional characters. Also working-class heroes.
During my one and only in-person meeting with Voltaire, shortly before he dies, we will argue about Shakespeare. I will [quoting the biography here] compare Shakespeare to the massive fifteenth-century statue of Saint Christopher that stood just outside the doors leading into Notre Dame Cathedral. While perhaps crude and rustic, this colossus was very much like Shakespeare...because "the greatest men still walk through his legs without the top of their head touching his testicles."
In case it's not clear, that means you and your stupid old-fashioned plays, Voltaire!
This meeting: *remains the only in-person encounter between Voltaire and Diderot, though the correspondence continues to be argumentatively friendly*
Sex: Incest, bestiality, and homosexuality are "natural", not sins. I myself experienced homoerotic attraction on at least one or two occasions, though I evidently never acted on it. No evidence I had any personal affinity for incest and bestiality, but I will definitely write unpublished fanfic where these things are presented positively. Also, free love, free love is cool!
Slavery: Go, future revolting slaves! Rise up and throw off your chains! (It's argued that Toussaint Louverture, leader of the Haitian revolution just a few years after Diderot's death, read the anti-slavery book that Diderot co-authored.)
Regicide: Sometimes called for. Will of the people and all that. Go future French revolutionaries, who will totally disclaim any association with me and treat my memory like shit after my death! [Reason: he was too freethinking even for them, especially the atheism.]
Colonialism: Omg, the LITERAL WORST. All Europe is complicit, not just slave-traders and merchants! STOP IT.
American Revolution: If you guys just left off with the BLATANT HYPOCRISY of espousing freedom while owning massive slave plantations, you'd be the literal best. Wish I weren't too old to travel there! Good luck! Come visit me! (He may have met Franklin in person, we're not sure, but they definitely had a mutual friend and knew of each other.)
Education: Forget Greek and Latin, we need to educate the majority of the population so that they know what their rights are and will defend them against tyranny.
Louis XVI: The French Revolution is coming. Joseph's not the only one who can see the writing on the wall. You [tu] need to fix everything right now, or else you're going to go down in history as a do-nothing tyrant. (Yes, he tu-ed King Louis in an actualfax published work that Louis got to read or at least hear about before banning.)
God: What God? Pure materialism, yeah! I myself will turn down a meeting with Voltaire when he's famous and I'm still an up-and-coming young man, because I feel like he's going to use the opportunity to try to convert me to deism. But we'll definitely argue about the existence of a deity by letter!
Seneca: 18C contemporaries, I know you all think Seneca was the worst, because he was a blatant hypocrite about being a luxury-rejecting Stoic while accumulating a fortune and cozying up to Nero, but here's several hundred pages about how he was the best, and sometimes you have to cozy up to tyrants to get anything done, even though it's questionable that we got anything done with our respective tyrants. (Seneca had more influence initially, but then he had to commit suicide. Diderot had no influence ever, but at least didn't have to commit suicide.)
Yeah, one of these things is not like the others. More on Diderot and tyrants later!
Diderot: Notice how I only got imprisoned for my first couple of works, and I spent my whole subsequent life in France happily churning out prodigious amounts of controversial work without ever getting imprisoned or exiled again. Beat that, Voltaire!
Voltaire: Notice how no one ever accused me of being conflict-averse.