French banned books in international perspective, 1770-1789

How did ordinary French and European readers experience illegal literature in the final years of the ancien regime? At a basic level, the answer to this question is in part bibliometric: it depends on what books were being sold and where. But how can we get at such information? Bibliography can reveal what was published on a global scale, and in how many editions. Literary scholarship and book history can provide indications of the reception of individual texts. And, of course, cultural historians from Daniel Mornet to Robert Darnton have tried to marry the two approaches by counting books in sources as varied as private library catalogues and booksellers orders to their publishers. Their bibliometric approach has been carried into the digital age by a team under my direction at the University of Leeds. During a five year project, we have created an on-line database of the entire international book trade of the important Swiss enlightenment publisher-bookseller, the Societe typographique de Neuchatel (STN).