author
M. de (Bernard Le Bovier) Fontenelle
1657–1757
A brilliant go-between for literature and science, this French writer helped make big ideas feel lively and approachable during the early Enlightenment. He is especially remembered for explaining scientific thought with elegance, wit, and unusual clarity.
1 Audiobook
Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds
by M. de (Bernard Le Bovier) Fontenelle
About the author
Born in Rouen in 1657, Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle lived nearly a full century, dying in Paris in 1757. He came from a literary family connected to the Corneilles, but he made his own name as a writer who moved easily between science, philosophy, and polite society.
Fontenelle is best known for bringing complex ideas to a broad audience. His Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds presented contemporary astronomy in a graceful, accessible way, helping popular science find a wider readership. He also became a major figure in French intellectual life through his long association with the Académie des Sciences and the Académie française.
What still makes him interesting is the tone of his work: curious, clear, and quietly playful. Writing at the hinge between the age of Louis XIV and the Enlightenment, he showed that serious subjects did not have to be heavy to be important.