Persian Letters
- Language:
- English
- Translation:
- John Davidson
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- Clean text · 1 illegible passages, excluded from answers
- Extent:
- ~110,000 words · 499 passages
Cite this work
- APAMontesquieu. (n.d.). Persian Letters. SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/montesquieu/persian-letters
- MLAMontesquieu. "Persian Letters." SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/montesquieu/persian-letters.
- ChicagoMontesquieu. Persian Letters. SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/montesquieu/persian-letters.
What it is about
The epistolary novel with which Montesquieu made his name in 1721, anonymously: two Persian travellers write from Paris about what they see there.
Context and history
The device is simple and lethal: to have France looked at by someone who takes nothing for granted. Usbek and Rica describe with polite bewilderment the king, the pope, the salons, fashion, the coffee-houses, the academies and religious customs, and the French reader suddenly sees himself as an exotic curiosity. Running alongside is the plot of Usbek's harem at Isfahan, which ends in tragedy and is where the book really raises the question of power and freedom. It was an immediate and scandalous success, and he had to publish it in Holland. The 'Persian letter' became a genre; much of the Enlightenment's machinery for criticising without appearing to criticise comes from here.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
,, XIX • 1 sbrk t<nn'' Iripiul Ku'^tiin. at 1 'pahaii 72 ,, XX . r.sbck to hi*, \Mie /<u'hi, at the Scrai;lumit Isp.ihan , . . -71 ,, XXI : I'slx'k to th' I tin t white haimich . 70 ,, XXll . laron to thi‘ Inst hainuch . . 77 ,, XXI II Issbek t(^ 1)1 > tnend Ibben, at Sinvi'iia 7S ,, XXIV : Ivu a to Ibbim. at Sinviiia . . yq ,, XXV ; I'sbfk to Iblnm, .it SiiiMiia . . 83 ,, XXVI . bsln'k to Ko\ana, at the Sorai^lio at ,, XXVI 1 . Iksbck to XtAsir, at Ispahan . . 88 iii CONTENTS Letter XXVTTI : Rica to * * ♦ . . . .89 ,, XXIX : Rica to Ibbcn, at Smyrna . . 92 ,, XXX : Rica to the Same, at Smyrna . . 94 ,, XX XI : Rhedi to Usbck, at Paris . . 96 „ XXXIII : Usbek to Rhedi, at Venice . . 98 „ XXXIV : Usbek to Ibben, at Smyrna . . 99 „ XXXV : Usbek to Gemchid, his Cousin, Dervish of the glorious INIonastery of Tauris ..... loi ,, XXXVI : Usbek to Rhedi, at Venice . .103 ,, XXXVIT : Usbek to Ibbcn, at Smyrna . . 105 ,, XXXVIII: Rica to Ibbcn, at Smyrna o. . 107 ,, XXXIX : Hagi Ibbi to the Jew Bon Joshua, Mohammedan Proselyte, at Smyrna . 109 ,, XL: Usbek to Ibben, at Smyrna . . in ,, XLI : The chief black Eunuch to Usbek . 112 ,, XLII : PlAran to Usbek, his Sovereign Lord 113 II Like Montaigne, Montesquieu was a Gascon. His father, Jacques de Secondat, married Marie-Frangoise de Penel, the descendant of an English family which had remained in France after the English rule had ceased there. Slie was an only child, and her husband received with her the title and barony of La BrMe, an estate in Gascon}^, with a fantastic old Gothic donjon built in tlie thirteenth century. Montesquieu was the second of six children. The date ot his birth is not known, but he was baptized on the i8th of