In June 2006 delegates from eight countries representing six French, US, and British-based learned societies met at St Catherine's College, Oxford, for a conference on the French long seventeenth century entitled 'Modernites/Modernities'. Nineteen of the best papers on theatre, fiction and poetry were selected for this volume, and they present new perspectives on novels as different as L'Astree and Le Roman bourgeois, comedy and tragedy, actors' practices, the ballet de cour and the burgeoning genre of opera, and a time span from Du Bellay to Mme de Gomez. The cardinal feature of this wide range of topics lies in the unifying factor of vibrant modernity.

In June 2006 delegates from eight countries representing six French, US, and British-based learned societies met at St Catherine's College, Oxford, for a conference on the French long seventeenth century entitled 'Modernites/Modernities'. Twenty of the best papers on religion, ethics and history were selected for this volume, and they present new perspectives on topics as diverse as devotion and pornography, artifice and the pursuit of truth, Bruscambille and Pascal, historiography from the sixteenth century to Voltaire, and, of course, the Querelle des Anciens et des Modernes.