The Time of Enlightenment: Constructing the Future in France, 1750 to Year One

“Scholars interested in the growing literature on the history of time, progress, and the future will find this book valuable reading. It is a careful but clear work on intellectual history, one with particular relevance for understanding the significance of the French Revolution.” Meghan K. Roberts, Bowdoin College, H-France Review

“In this insightful, richly researched, and theoretically astute work, William Max Nelson views the Enlightenment not as era, movement, or project, but as ‘attempts to develop new ways of being in the world that could come to grips with the erosion of traditional notions of God and legitimating narratives of political authority and social hierarchy.’ … This book is a valuable and thought-provoking contribution to that process.” Daniel Brewer, University of Minnesota, French Studies

“This wide-ranging book makes a valuable contribution to a still fragmentary field of historical time studies.” Sanja Perovic, King’s College London, American Historical Review

"Drawing on up-to-date scholarship, William Max Nelson engages in interesting ways with the historiography of the Enlightenment and the history of science in the eighteenth century. This study delves deeply into the concept of progress by focusing on references to a constructible future and possibilities, within limits, to change the world for the better."

Denise Davidson, Department of History, Georgia State University

"This is an important book that engages with a rapidly expanding body of work that explores what might be called the history of time. Theoretically sophisticated and exhibiting an impressive command of the literature on the French enlightenment, The Time of Enlightenment offers an important and original historical perspective for those interested in the problem of imagining the future."

Kevin Lambert, Department of Liberal Studies, California State University, Fullerton

"This book is bound to appeal to historians of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution, as well as historians of science and those interested in the history of ideas. With William Max Nelson’s elegant phrasing and impressive skill at explicating even complex ideas, any reader would admire the erudition of the study and the panache with which its ideas are expressed."

Thomas Stammers, Department of History, Durham University