Journals, Literary

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JOURNALS, LITERARY

JOURNALS, LITERARY. Literary journals appeared in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to provide a growing readership with news and gossip about literary matters and a sampling of contemporary writings. Like novels, coffeehouses, and salons, literary journals appealed to an emerging public keen on fashioning its own cultural tastes and literary opinions.

Though the best-known literary journals, such as The Tatler and The Spectator in England, were independent publications launched by enterprising men of letters, others, especially early periodicals, originated from official sponsorship. The Journal des savants, for example, was created by Jean-Baptiste Colbert in 1665 and combined scientific and technical information with the most noteworthy news from "the Republic of Letters." The Mercure galant, founded in 1672, was also a quasi-official publication: its editor was provided lodgings in the Louvre and received a royal pension. It furnished readers with news of the court and Parisian society, as well as commentary on literary, theatrical, and scientific events. France was not the only nation to give rise to literary journals in the seventeenth century. In Italy the Journal des savants served as a model for several Giornali dei letterati, which began appearing in 1668.

It was in the eighteenth century that this type of periodical, like newspapers in general, began to appear throughout western Europe, becoming an important feature of urban culture and sociability. Germany had its Litteratur-Zeitung; Spain its Espiritu de los mejores diarios; Italy its Giornale dei letterati d'Italia, published in Venice starting in 1710. Many of these newspapers, especially those in Germany and Spain, had a very limited circulation of only several hundred readers. The Mercure galant, however, was distributed in twenty-six provincial towns in 1748 and fifty-five by 1774.

By far the most successful and influential literary newspapers were The Tatler (1709–1711), edited by the playwright Richard Steele, and The Spectator (1711–1712), a joint venture of Steele and the poet Joseph Addison. Though in part literary in nature, they were "moral" in spirit, aimed at improving manners and fostering sociability in a society increasingly dominated by the competitive spirit of commercialism. The success of these periodicals was enormous: The Spectator went from a circulation of 4,000 to around 30,000 in a few months. They also inspired emulators on the Continent despite the fact that the conditions for publication, such as censorship and a limited reading public, were clearly less favorable. The French writer Pierre de Marivaux (1688–1763) took Addison's journal as his model for the Spectateur français (1722). The first German weekly, the Hamburg Vernunftler (1713–1740), was also fashioned after the English newspapers. Justus van Effen (1684–1735) began publishing the journal Le misantrope in Holland and also published De Hollandsche Spectator (1731–1735).

Literary newspapers were integral to the culture of the Enlightenment. Indeed, well-known men of letters, such as Jean-François Marmontel, who edited the Mercure de France in 1758–1760, helped transform these publications into organs of Enlightenment, offering fellow philosophes popular and convenient outlets for their ideas. They also served as agents of national integration, bringing the fashion, language, and news of the court and capital to the provinces. But these journals were not simply one-way instruments: they invited readers' comments and printed their letters, thus fostering discussion and debate. Many of their readers were women. Nearly half of the articles appearing in Addison and Steele's newspapers addressed female concerns. In France the Journal des dames, which specifically aimed at a female readership, was inaugurated in 1759.

Literary journals scrupulously avoided the contentious topics of politics and religion. It was in part because of this that they were able both to flourish and to create a public out of readers who might otherwise find themselves at odds.

See also Addison, Joseph ; Colbert, Jean-Baptiste ; Journalism, Newspapers, and Newssheets ; Steele, Richard .