L’érudition et le plaisir de la lecture à Arad au début du XIXe siècle

Abstract

The interest in secular literature in Arad County manifested itself from the second half of the 18th century, when two booksellers from Budapest began to sell books at local fairs and when two libraries in Arad and Maria Radna were established by the Conventual Franciscans. In addition to the need to buy, own and read various books, at the beginning of the 19th century in the city of Arad appeared – as a late manifestation of the Enlightenment - a desire to produce, with dedication, small-sized books, on leaflets, and to give them to those attending public readings. At the same time, with this need for erudition, the first French and Italian novels, some of them considered licentious - thus satisfying "guilty" pleasures, appeared in the libraries of the nobles. From a time perspective, we are talking about rarities which were, at the moment of their acquisition, an illustration of the phenomenon of the readings of an epoch.