Salon, academy, and boudoir: Generation and desire in Maupertuis's science of life

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Volumn 87, Issue 2, 1996, Pages 217-229

  Terrall, Mary ^a  

^a NONE   (United States)

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EID: 33750103212     PISSN: 00211753     EISSN: 15456994     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1086/357481     Document Type: Article

References (90)

1. [P.-L. M. de Maupertuis], Dissertation physique à l'occasion du nègre blanc (Leyden, 1744);
2. published in expanded form as Vénus physique in 1745.
3. use the modern edition, which also contains Lettre sur le progrès des sciences:
4. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, suivi de la Lettre sur le progrès des sciences, ed. Patrick Tort (Paris: Aubier Montaigne, 1980)
5. (hereafter cited as Maupertuis, Vénus physique), p. 79.
6. Here and elsewhere, translations are mine unless otherwise indicated. Maupertuis's "system" is discussed in detail later in this essay. The best accounts of Maupertuis's investigations are Jacques Roger, Les sciences de la vie dans la pensée française du XVIIIe siècle (Paris: Armand Colin, 1971);
7. and Michael Hoffheimer, "Maupertuis and the Eighteenth-Century Critique of Preexistence," Journal of the History of Biology, 1982, 15:119-144.
8. An earlier generation of commentary sought to rehabilitate Maupertuis as a precursor to Darwin; see Bentley Glass, "Maupertuis, Pioneer of Genetics and Evolution," in Forerunners of Darwin, ed. Glass et al. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1967), pp. 51-83.
9. This argument is discussed and refuted by Anne Fagot, "Le transformisme de Maupertuis," in Actes de la journée Maupertuis (Paris: Vrin, 1975), pp. 163-178.
10. Pierre Brunet, Maupertuis: Étude biographique (Paris: Albert Blanchard, 1929);
11. David Beeson, Maupertuis: An Intellectual Biography (Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 1992);
12. Mary Terrall, "Representing the Earth's Shape: The Polemics Surrounding Maupertuis's Expedition to Lapland," Isis, 1992, 83:218-237;
13. and Rob Iliffe, "'Aplatisseur du monde et de Cassini': Maupertuis, Precision Measurement, and the Shape of the Earth in the 1730s," History of Science, 1993, 31:335-375.
14. Others who managed this kind of cultural flexibility included Crebillon fils, Diderot, Montesquieu, d'Argens, Duclos, Clairaut, and Buffon. On the Prussian Academy of Sciences under Maupertuis's leadership see Mary Terrall, "The Culture of Science in Frederick the Great's Berlin," Hist. Sci., 1990, 28:333-364.
15. Robert Darnton, The Literary Underground of the Old Regime (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1982);
16. Darnton, The Forbidden Bestsellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (New York: Norton, 1994);
17. and Robert Ellrich, "Modes of Discourse and the Language of Sexual Reference in Eighteenth-Century French Fiction," in 'Tis Nature's Fault: Unauthorized Sexuality during the Enlightenment, ed. Robert MacCubbin (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1985), pp. 217-228.
18. On scientific demonstrations see Geoffrey Sutton, Science for a Polite Society: Gender, Culture, and the Demonstration of Enlightenment (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1995).
19. Robert Darnton's work makes this point; see esp. Darnton, Edition et sédition: L'univers de la littérature clandestine au XVIIIième siècle (Paris: Gallimard, 1991).
20. See also Ira O. Wade, The Clandestine Organization and Diffusion of Philosophical Ideas in France from 1700 to 1750 (New York: Octagon, 1967).
21. E.g., [Anonymous], Histoire de Dom Bougre, portier des Chartreux (1741),
22. in Oeuvres anonymes du XVIIIe siècle (I): L'enfer de la Bibliothèque nationale (Paris: Fayard, 1985);
23. and [Jean-Baptiste Boyer, marquis d'Argens], Thérèse philosophe (1st ed., 1748);
24. in Oeuvres anonymes du XVIIIe siècle (III): L'enfer de la Bibliothèque nationale (Paris: Fayard, 1985). On pornography in this period
25. see Jean-Marie Goulemot, Ces livres qu'on ne lit que d'une main: Lecture et lecteurs de livres pornographiques au XVIIIième siècle (Aix-en-Provence: Alinéa, 1991),
26. translated into English as Forbidden Texts: Erotic Literature and Its Readers in Eighteenth-Century France, trans. James Simpson (Oxford: Polity, 1995);
27. Kathryn Norberg, "The Libertine Whore," in The Invention of Pornography, ed. Lynn Hunt (New York: Zone, 1993), pp. 225-252;
28. and Darnton, Forbidden Bestsellers (cit. n. 4).
29. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, p. 73.
30. On the role of secrecy in politics see René-Louis de Voyer, marquis d'Argenson, Journal and Memoirs of the Marquis d'Argenson, trans. Katharine Wormeley, 2 vols. (Boston: Hardy, Pratt, 1902), Vol. 1, pp. 94, 98.
31. On gossip, newsmongers, and public opinion see Ariette Farge, Subversive Words: Public Opinion in Eighteenth-Century France, trans. Rosemary Morris (University Park: Pennsylvania State Univ. Press, 1994), pp. 9-53.
32. René-Antoine de Réaumur, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire des insectes, 6 vols., Vol. 6 (Paris, 1742), p. 547.
33. On theories of generation during this period see Roger, Sciences de la vie (cit. n. 1).
34. Roger, Sciences de la vie, pp. 409-418;
35. and Hoffheimer, "Maupertuis and the Critique of Preexistence" (cit. n. 1).
36. Patrick Tort, L'ordre et les monstres (Paris: Le Sycomore, 1980), analyzes the monster debate for the whole of the century and gives a bibliography of the primary sources.
37. [Maupertuis], Dissertation physique (cit. n. 1);
38. and Maupertuis, Vénus physique, p. 73.
39. The same boy was also discussed by Voltaire: "Relation touchant un maure blanc amené d'Afrique à Paris en 1744," in F. M. A. de Voltaire, Oeuvres, ed. M. Beuchot (Paris: Lefèvre, 1830), Vol. 38, pp. 521-524.
40. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, pp. 79, 79-80: "Il sent une nouvelle ardeur pour tout ce qu'il entreprend: tout lui promet d'heureux succès. Celle qui l'a charmé s'enflamme du même feu dont il brûle: elle se rend, elle se livre à ses transports; et l'amant heureux parcourt avec rapidité toutes les beautés qui l'ont ébloui: il est déjà parvenu à l'endroit le plus délicieux.... Ah malheureux! qu'un couteau mortel a privé de la connoissance de cet état: le ciseau qui eut tranché le fil de vos jours, vous eut été moins funeste. En vain vous habitez de vastes Palais;... vous possédez toutes les richesses de l'Asie; le dernier de vos esclaves qui peut gouter ces plaisirs, est plus heureux que vous."
41. E.g., the euphemism "l'endroit le plus délicieux" appears in the notorious Histoire de Dom Bougre, in Oeuvres anonymes du XVIIIe siècle (I) (cit. n. 6), p. 34.
42. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, p. 80: "C'est cette instant marqué par tant de délices, qui donne l'être à une nouvelle créature, qui pourra comprendre les choses les plus sublimes: et, ce qui est bien au-dessus, qui pourra gouter les mêmes plaisirs."
43. Réaumur, Histoire des insectes (cit. n. 8), Vol. 4 (Paris, 1738), p. xxix.
44. For an attack on Vénus physique
45. see [Gilles Basset des Rosiers], L'Anti-Vénus physique (Paris, 1746).
46. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, pp. 86, 88, 84, 102, 104, 102.
47. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, Ibid., p. 139.
48. On affinity chemistry see Hélène Metzger, Newton, Stahl, Boerhaave et la doctrine chimique (Paris: Felix Alcan, 1930);
49. and Michelle Sadoun-Goupil, Du flou au clair: Histoire de l'affinité chimique de Carda à Prigogne (Paris: Editions du CTHS, 1991).
50. Originally published pseudonymously in Latin as Baumann, Dissertatio inauguralis metaphysica de universali naturae systemate (Erlangen, 1751);
51. translation published anonymously as Essai sur la formation des corps organisés (Berlin [Paris], 1754);
52. included under the title Systême de la nature in P.-L. M. de Maupertuis, Oeuvres, 4 vols., Vol. 2 (Lyon: Bruyset, 1756).
53. There is also a modern edition: Maupertuis, Essai de cosmologie; Systême de la nature, ed. Francois Azouvi (Paris: Vrin, 1984).
54. Maupertuis, Systême de la nature, in Oeuvres, Vol. 2, p. 147:
55. "Il faut avoir recours à quelque principe d'intelligence, à quelque chose semblable à ce que nous appelions désir, aversion, mémoire." Maupertuis, Oeuvres, Ibid., p. 158: "Mais chacun extrait de la partie semblable à celle qu'il doit former, conserve une espece de souvenir de son ancienne situation; et l'ira reprendre toutes les fois qu'il le pourra, pour former dans le foetus la même partie." See also p. 141.
56. Maupertuis, Oeuvres, Ibid., pp. 169, 170.
57. Animal breeders "apply themselves to satisfying the taste of the curious; they are, so to speak, creators of new species," who promote fashions for new breeds of dogs, cats, and birds: Maupertuis, Vénus physique, p. 134.
58. Practices connected with keeping and breeding pets in prosperous households are not well documented. Maupertuis kept cats and dogs, and he shared this hobby with salon women. In 1742 Mme. du Deffand arranged for Maupertuis to trade a copy of his book La figure de la terre for an Angora kitten from Mme. du Boufflers; see Mme. du Deffand to P.-L. M. de Maupertuis, 18 June [1742] (Bibliothèque Nationale, n.a. Fr. 10398), published in Georges Hervé, "Les correspondantes de Maupertuis: Dix lettres inédites de Mme. du Deffand," Revue de Paris, 1911, 5:751-778, p. 763.
59. D'Aumont, "Génération," in Encyclopédie; ou, Dictionnaire raisonnée des sciences, des arts et des métiers, ed. Denis Diderot and Jean Le Rond d'Alembert, Vol. 7 (1757), pp. 559-574.
60. Denis Diderot, "Jouissance," in Encyclopédie, ed. Diderot and d'Alembert, Vol. 8 (1765), p. 889.
61. On eighteenth-century salons see Dena Goodman, "Enlightenment Salons: The Convergence of Female and Philosophic Ambitions," Eighteenth-Century Studies. 1989, 22:329-350;
62. Goodman, "Governing the Republic of Letters: The Politics of Culture of the French Enlightenment," History of European Ideas, 1991, 13:183-199;
63. Goodman, The Republic of Letters: A Cultural History of the French Enlightenment (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, 1994);
64. Daniel Gordon, Citizens without Sovereignty: Equality and Sociability in French Thought, 1670-1789 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1994);
65. and Benedetta Craveri, Madame du Deffand et son monde (Paris: Editions de Seuil, 1987).
66. For recent work that figures nature as a female exploited by science and scientists see, e.g., Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution (New York: Harper & Row, 1980);
67. Brian Easlea, Witch Hunting, Magic, and the New Philosophy (Brighton, Sussex: Harvester, 1980);
68. and Londa Schiebinger, The Mind Has No Sex? Women in the Origins of Modem Science (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1989).
69. Joseph Desmahis, "Femme (morale)," in Encyclopédie, ed. Diderot and d'Alembert, Vol. 6 (1756), pp. 473, 472.
70. See also Lieselotte Steinbrügge, The Moral Sex: Woman's Nature in the French Enlightenment, trans. Pamela E. Selwyn (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1995).
71. For another example of the uses of the female audience see Mary Terrall, "Gendered Spaces, Gendered Audiences: Inside and Outside the Paris Academy of Sciences," Configurations, 1995, 3:207-232.
72. Ludmilla Jordanova, Sexual Visions: Images of Gender in Science and Medicine between the Eighteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Madison: Univ. Wisconsin Press, 1989);
73. and Thomas Laqueur, Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1990).
74. Joan DeJean makes a similar argument for the cooptation of the novel as a female literary genre by male authors in this period in Tender Geographies: Women and the Origins of the Novel in France (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1991).
75. Other Enlightenment writers crossed the boundary into pornography more explicitly (though also anonymously): Diderot, La Mettrie, Crebillon fils. See Aram Vartanian, "La Mettrie, Diderot, and Sexology in the Enlightenment," in Essays on the Age of Enlightenment in Honor of Ira O. Wade, ed. Jean Macary (Geneva: Droz, 1977), pp. 347-367.
76. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, p. 103.
77. On pornography in the 1740s see Goulemot, Ces livres (cit. n. 6);
78. Ellrich, "Modes of Discourse" (cit. n. 4), p. 224;
79. Margaret Jacob, "The Materialist World of Pornography," in Invention of Pornography, ed. Hunt (cit. n. 6), pp. 157-202;
80. and Darnton, Forbidden Bestsellers (cit. n. 4), pp. 87-90.
81. [Anonymous], Mademoiselle Javotte (1757), cited in Norberg, "Libertine Whore" (cit. n. 6), p. 238. Norberg emphasizes the old-fashioned aspect of this symmetry, following Laqueur. Read in light of scientific work on seminal fluids and epigenesis from the same period, it seems less archaic.
82. Jacob, "Materialist World of Pornography" (cit. n. 28);
83. and [d'Argens], Thérèse philosophe, in Oeuvres anonymes du XVIIIe siècle (III) (cit. n. 6), pp. 50-51.
84. For investigation of the analogy between male and female seminal fluids see Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon, "Découverte de la liqueur seminale dans les femelles vivipares, et au reservoir qui la contient," Mémoires de l'Académie Royale des Sciences, 1748, pp. 211-228. Even before he developed his own theory of active organic matter, Buffon worked to discredit preexistence theories by looking for female seminal fluids. He found in the ovaries of rabbits, dogs, and cows "a seminal liquid, animated and similar to the seminal liquid of the male" (p. 211). In his drawing of what he saw in the microscope, these female "animaux spermatiques" look remarkably like those in semen.
85. Maupertuis, Vénus physique, p. 139.
86. Diderot pretended to read it this way in his own materialist manifesto, L'interpretation de la nature (1st ed., 1753),
87. in Denis Diderot, Oeuvres complètes, Vol. 9, ed. Jean Varloot (Paris: Hermann, 1981).
88. Maupertuis responded in "Réponses aux objections de M. Diderot," in Maupertuis, Oeuvres, Vol. 2 (cit. n. 18), pp. 185-216.
89. See Aram Vartanian, "Diderot and Maupertuis," Revue Internationale de Philosophie, 1984, 148:46-66.
90. Maupertuis, Systême de la nature (cit. n. 18), pp. 183-184.