The Culture of Power and the Power of Culture: Old Regime Europe 1660-1789

In this fascinating new account of Old Regime Europe T.C.W. Blanning explores the cultural revolution which transformed eighteenth-century Europe. During this period the court culture exemplified by Louis XIVs Versailles was pushed from the center to the margins by the emergence of a new kind of space - the public sphere. The author shows how many of the worlds most important cultural institutions developed in this space: the periodical the newspaper the novel the lending library the coffee house the voluntary association the journalist and the critic.