Description: Jonathan Israel offers a novel interpretation of the Radical Enlightenment down to La Mettie and Diderot, two of its key exponents. Particular emphasis is placed on the pivotal role of Spinoza and the widespread underground international philosophical movement known before 1750 as Spinozism.
Review Quotes: "His vast--and vastly impressive--book sets out to redefine the intellectual landscape of early modern Europe....Magnificent and magisterial, Radical Enlightenment will undoubtedly be one of the truly great historical works of the decade."--John Adamson, Sunday Telegraph
"[A] magnificent...study of the impact of Spinoza and his philosophy on European cultural history at the hinge of the 17th and 18th centuries....Sumptuous in the energy, clarity and breadth of its scholarship."--Los Angeles Times Book Review"Mr. Israel's lucid, engrossing account of the Enlightenment's formative period explains why we want our intellectual histories rewritten for every generation, for this Enlightenment overflows with our favorite things."--The Scriblerian"Israel's Radical Enlightenment is an audacious, pathbreaking, and deeply learned work that may be read on a multiplicity of levels. For the specialist, it is a thick empirical survey and analysis of a vast strain of thought derived from the work of Benedict de Spinoza."--Journal of Interdisciplinary History