Voltaire's history of Tsar Peter the Great paints him as the original enlightened despot, bringing civilisation to a barbaric empire and creating a lasting Enlightenment society, worthily succeeded by Voltaire's patron Catherine the Great. This two-volume edition takes its text primarily from the last edition that Voltaire personally oversaw, that of 1775. The critical apparatus is both detailed and effective, containing pertinent notes, lengthily comparisons of editions, a glossary and twelve appendices, including Voltaire's letters regarding the work's composition and the critical response it received. This superb edition offers for the first time a chance to assess all of the elements of Voltaire's complicated relationship with the idea of Tsar Peter.

The new edition of Voltaire's works produced by Cramer in 1756 in close collaboration with the author contained, in volumes 4 and 5, 'Melanges de litterature, d'histoire et de philosophie'. Alongside significant works previously published were a number of new texts, some related, some standing alone, that reflect not only Voltaire's perennial interests, but a new way of presenting them in short articles or 'petits chapitres', as he referred to them. These new texts form the major part of this volume 45B of the OEuvres completes de Voltaire.

Edition critique par Michel Mervaud, accompagnee d'une etude de Madeleine Pinault Sorensen sur les superbes planches de l'ouvrage d'apres les dessins de Le Prince. Le recit de Chappe, astronome et academicien, parut en 1768. Severe a l'egard de la Russie et des Russes, il suscita une refutation attribuee a Catherine II. Cette edition interessera les dix-huitiemistes, les historiens, les slavistes, et les comparatistes. Michel Mervaud est ancien eleve de l'ENS de Saint-Cloud, agrege de russe, et professeur honoraire a l'universite de Rouen. Son ouvrage le plus recent est une edition critique de l'Histoire de l'empire de Russie sous Pierre le Grand de Voltaire (OEuvres completes de Voltaire, Oxford). Madeleine Pinault Sorensen, chargee d'etudes au departement des arts graphiques du musee du Louvre, a consacre ses recherches aux planches de l'Encyclopedie de D'Alembert et Diderot et au dessin scientifique au XVIIIe siecle.