Panorama of the Enlightenment

This book is another of Thames & Hudson's high-quality "coffee-table" type of publications that is beautifully illustrated. I don't believe there is another highly illustrated book like this that focuses entirely on the Enlightenment, so it fills a noteworthy gap in the literature. More importantly, Dorinda Outram's narrative is a needed antidote to the overbearing imbalance that has existed thus far in the English-speaking literature on the Enlightenment. Far too many books make it seem as if the Enlightenment was strictly a French or English affair, which, as Jonathan Israel has recently shown in his magisterial Radical Enlightenment, is a complete distortion. The reason for this is simple: American and British historians lack the language abilities to incorporate German intellectual history into their work, and there are more English translations of French philosophe literature available to them. The German Aufklaerung, or Enlightenment, was just as rich and dramatic as what was occurring in France and England, and the contributions that German thinkers make just as important to modern history. The Aufklaerung in Germany leads directly to the era of German Idealism, arguably the most significant period in the history of philosophy (including the Greeks). Outram's book gives a very different perspective than the anglocentric and francophile Enlightenment literature, one that is more balanced and accurate of the historical reality. With the stunning illustrations this book represents a much-appreciated contribution to Enlightenment literature.