Introduction: What is the public sphere? -- pt. 1. Politics and the rise of "public opinion": the cases of England and France: The peculiarities of the English -- Opacity and transparency: French political culture in the eighteenth century -- pt. 2. Readers, writers, and spectators: Reading publics: transformations of the literary public sphere -- Writing publics: eighteenth-century authorship -- From courts to consumers: theater publics -- pt. 3. Being sociable: Women in public: Enlightenment salons -- Drinking in public: taverns and coffeehouses -- Freemasonry: toward civil society
Summary
In the New Approaches to European History series, this title provides an inter-disciplinary study of the rise of 'the public' in eighteenth-century Europe. James Melton's lucid and accessible account will be of interest to students of social and political history, literary studies, political theory, and the history of women
