Abstract

This study explores the different ways in which specific currents in eighteenth-century French literature, medicine, and philosophy impact the development of a discourse on eroticism. ;Although the libertine novel is traditionally associated with eroticism, libertinage actually designates a form of dominant, rather than hedonistic, behavior. Libertinage has for its end the mastery of self and other. An examination of libertine novels reveals that the libertine's goal of negating affect essentially empties sexuality of its erotic potential. Furthermore, the restricted social milieu within which the libertine operates mandates adherence to certain behavioral norms. Thus, rather than promote unbridled pleasure-seeking, these texts actually serve to reinforce a certain idea of sociability. It is the Marquis de Sade who takes libertinage out of its worldly context and permits the development of an extreme form of libertinage. ;Instead of elucidating the secrets of the human body, Enlightenment treatises on sexual pathology reaffirm societal norms by reducing sex to its procreative function, thereby eliminating the possibility of a discourse on eroticism. Through what becomes a poetic, as opposed to a scientific, process of pathologization, these literary texts focus on social rather than medical preoccupations and fail to provide concrete evidence of the nefarious conditions they purport to treat. Ultimately, sexual pathology is transformed into social pathology and authors like Auguste Tissot, in L'Onanisme, and D. T. Bienville, in La Nymphomanie, reinforce social conventions by redirecting sexual behavior to more acceptable ends, such as marriage. ;Finally, while not typically associated with eroticism, philosophy offers the most fertile terrain for an investigation of Enlightenment eroticism: the materialism of Julien Offray de la Mettrie and Denis Diderot. To solve the problem of social regulation of sexuality, La Mettrie quite simply removes the individual from society. In articulating his philosophy, La Mettrie places the sovereign good, la volupte, beyond the limits of conventional morality. Philosophy, the individual, and la volupte are thus linked in an indissoluble nexus. However, La Mettrie's solution, his radical individualism, is precisely that which limits application of his theory. At some level, Diderot, too, envisions society as an inhospitable place for eroticism--this is the lesson of Le Supplement au voyage de Bougainville--but, unlike La Mettrie, he does not posit an irreconcilable split between society and eroticism. In his masterful Le Reve de d'Alembert, Diderot demonstrates that philosophy and eroticism are bound together in such a way as to assure cohesion of the social unit. Thus, within the context of a philosophical discourse, Diderot formulates a conception of eroticism that moves beyond the individual to the social level