In a speech delivered in 1794, roughly one year after the execution of Louis XVI, Robespierre boldly declared Terror to be an 'emanation of virtue'. In adapting the concept of virtue to Republican ends, Robespierre was drawing on traditions associated with ancient Greece and Rome. But Republican tradition formed only one of many strands in debates concerning virtue in France and elsewhere in Europe, from 1680 to the Revolution. This collection focuses on moral-philosophical and classical-republican uses of 'virtue' in this period - one that is often associated with a 'crisis of the European mind'. It also considers in what ways debates concerning virtue involved gendered perspectives. The texts discussed are drawn from a range of genres, from plays and novels to treatises, memoirs, and libertine literature. They include texts by authors such as Diderot, Laclos, and Madame de Stael, plus other, lesser-known texts that broaden the volume's perspective. Collectively, the contributors to the volume highlight the central importance of virtue for an understanding of an era in which, as Daniel Brewer argues in the closing chapter, 'the political could not be thought outside its moral dimension, and morality could not be separated from inevitable political consequences'.

What is the role of the prude in the Roman libertin? James Fowler argues that in the most famous novels of the genre the prude is not the libertine's victim but an equal and opposite force working against him, and that ultimately she brings retribution for his social, erotic and philosophical presumption."

Is happiness catching? Are your friends making you fat? Can your sibling make you smart? Is wealth contagious? Where is true love found? Does free will exist? Based on exciting discoveries in mathematics, genetics, psychology and sociology, 'Connected' is an innovative and fascinating exploration of how social networks operate. Think it's all about who you know? It is. But not the way you think. Turns out your colleague's husband's sister can make you fat, even if you don't know her. And a happy friend is more relevant to your happiness than a bigger income. Our connections - our friends, their friends, and even their friends' friends - have an astonishing power to influence everything from what we eat to who we sleep with. And we, in turn, influence others. Our actions can change the behaviours, the beliefs, and even the basic health of people we've never met. In this brilliantly original and effortlessly engaging exploration of how much we truly influence one another. Pre-eminent social scientists Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler explain why obesity is contagious, why the rich get richer, even how we find and choose our partners. Intriguing and entertaining, with revelatory implications for everything from our notion of the individual to ideas about public health initiatives, 'Connected' will change the way you think about every aspect of your life, and how you live it.

This book inquires why the philosophes converge on Samuel Richardson and with what results. It focuses on the two-way or 'cross-Channel' flow in texts and ideas that continued between Britain and France throughout the long eighteenth century.

This book discusses Fowler's thesis on the establishment of a symbiotic relationship between the libertine and the prude in a number of key eighteenth-century texts. He stresses that prude and libertine need each other to define themselves, a symbiosis most graphically enacted in the Sadean orgy.

The great eighteenth-century French thinker Denis Diderot (1713-84) once compared himself to a weathervane, by which he meant that his mind was in constant motion. In an extraordinarily diverse career he produced novels, plays, art criticism, works of philosophy and poetics, and also reflected on music and opera. Perhaps most famously, he ensured the publication of the Encyclopedie, which has often been credited with hastening the onset of the French Revolution. Known as one of the three greatest philosophes of the Enlightenment, Diderot rejected the Christian ideas in which he had been raised. Instead, he became an atheist and a determinist. His radical questioning of received ideas and established religion led to a brief imprisonment, and for that reason, no doubt, some of his subsequent works were written for posterity. This collection of essays celebrates the life and work of this extraordinary figure as we approach the tercentenary of his birth.

Why do organisations decline, and what happens when they do? Strategy and Managed Decline: London Transport 1948-87 is a historical case study looking at how London Transport, a world beater in 1948, declined from being an international exemplar to dilapidation in 30 years. Strategy and Managed Decline considers the inheritance left by the founders of London Transport and subjects their legacy to a strategic and political audit. In three sections, the book examines archival data from the Transport for London (TfL) Archive covering the car revolution, strategic political clashes and the performance of the chairmen to challenge existing theory and extant histories. It offers hypotheses situated in management, leadership, politics and strategy which explain the decades of deterioration followed by a dramatic revival in the late 1980s. Examining the turbulent politics of the long conflict between London Transport, municipal and national government in detail, Strategy and Managed Decline: London Transport 1948-87 offers novel interpretations of events by objectively analysing the strategic stories that politics created about London's transport. It concludes by asking whether a shift in managerial strategy away from maximising utility and towards cost minimisation caused, or was just coincident with, resurgence and explores what lessons there are for TfL today.

With an Introduction and Notes by James Fowler, Senior Lecturer in French, University of Kent Candide (1759) is a bright, colourful literary firework display of a novella. With sparkling wit and biting humour, Voltaire hits several targets with fierce and comic satire: organised religion, the overweening pride of aristocrats, merchants' greed, colonial ambition and the hopeless complacency of Leibnizian philosophy that believes 'all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds'. Through this rites of passage story, with his central character, Candide, a naive and impressionable young man, Voltaire attacks the social ills of his day, which remarkably remain as pertinent now as ever. Zadig is a tale of love and detection. Edgar Allan Poe was inspired by this story when he created C. Auguste Dupin in 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue', a story which established the modern detective fiction genre. The Ingenu recounts how a young man raised by Huron Indians discover the ways of Europe. Nanine is a sharp three act comedy concerned with marital dilemmas. In all these works Voltaire manages to combine humour with trenchant satire in a highly entertaining fashion.

This book presents articles at the interface of two active areas of research: classical topology and the relatively new field of geometric group theory. It includes two long survey articles, one on proofs of the Farrell-Jones conjectures, and the other on ends of spaces and groups. In 2010-2011, Ohio State University (OSU) hosted a special year in topology and geometric group theory. Over the course of the year, there were seminars, workshops, short weekend conferences, and a major conference out of which this book resulted. Four other research articles complement these surveys, making this book ideal for graduate students and established mathematicians interested in entering this area of research.

The London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB) was a unique hybrid public body accountable only to a small number of stakeholders, yet it delivered substantial improvements in public services and provided good working conditions for its employees at the cost of its investors. London Transport: A Hybrid in History 1905-48 innovatively combines a revisionist historical narrative with a systematic analysis of quantitative and qualitative research to explore how and why the LPTB achieved rare popularity amongst its customers. Divided into three sections, the book explores the financial operations of the Board, the Board as a system of governance and the leadership and management within the LPTB. Using the extensive Transport for London archives, James Fowler conducts a timely assessment of the public network utility that once made London transport domestically popular and internationally admired. With debates about British transport policy ongoing, this book is an illuminating read for scholars and students researching within the areas of business management history, transport and public sector governance and administration.

This book presents articles at the interface of two active areas of research: classical topology and the relatively new field of geometric group theory. It includes two long survey articles, one on proofs of the Farrell-Jones conjectures, and the other on ends of spaces and groups. In 2010-2011, Ohio State University (OSU) hosted a special year in topology and geometric group theory. Over the course of the year, there were seminars, workshops, short weekend conferences, and a major conference out of which this book resulted. Four other research articles complement these surveys, making this book ideal for graduate students and established mathematicians interested in entering this area of research.