Free To the Hermitage by Malcolm Bradbury

the prophet of the modern soul, the man who gave us doubt, anxiety, mind over matter, who taught us to question, investigate, observe, is notable only for his uneffacing silent absence. Of the thinker’s thinker, there is neither tomb nor trace, effigy or epitaph, residue nor relic, sign nor signification. I’m confused, I’m engaged, I’m seriously dismayed. Could it be that something a little strange and fantastical happened to the late excellent René Descartes?

FOUR (THEN)
    T HIS ALL GOES BACK ten years now, to another time: the heyday of the great book itself. ‘ ENCYCLOPEDIA : Noun, feminine gender. The word signifies unity of knowledge,’ our man wrote then. ‘In truth, the aim of an encyclopedia is to collect all knowledge that now lies scattered all over the face of the earth; to make known its general structure to those among whom we live; and to transmit it onward to those who come after us, our Posterity.’ It was the truly grand
projet
, the Book of the Age, the great narrative of all things known and thought, and nothing in the universe mattered more. But writing the book of the age was to prove dirty, ill-paid and bitter work; dangerous and persecuted work too, with court, church and censor rightly suspicious of every tendency, every word, every hidden hint. And if there’s also a sharp-tongued wife who’s always complaining about the condition of literary poverty, and a decent dancing child of a daughter who when she reaches the age of sexual reason will require a handsome dowry, then our dear Denis the Daydreamer will need to do something quite serious to survive . . .
    Why not, then: why not let considerate husband and admiring father despoil the philosopher and man of letters? For his richest treasure lies right in front of him – in the grasp of his own two hands, or piled up there on his desk, or stacked round the walls about him. His library – 2,904 leather-bound volumes – is among the finest of the day. In fact it’s nothing less than the library of the
Encyclopedia
– which makes it the library of the Enlightenment itself. He buys all books, he reads everything, he translates many languages. He grabs up every kind of learning, classic and modern, philosophic, medical, mechanical. He accumulates every printed wisdom. He corresponds with everyone of interest. And he’s annotated the books, all of them, in his own small hand, with his own large mind. Some of these volumes contain a brand-new book of their own, an entire supplement written crabbedly into the margins or across the type. And hasn’t he in turn, using the books, himself written the bulk of the book of books, the
Encyclopedia
itself: a work he’s struggled with, suffered with, nearly rotted in jail for? Isn’t it time to put it all to market?
    No sooner thought of than done. It’s not so hard to work out who might buy. The notion has only to be mentioned to his dear, dandyish, tuft-hunting old friend Melchior Grimm – fat dapper traveller, visitor to every court in Europe, cultural correspondent to royalty, marriage counsellor to the aristocracy, escort agency, whisperer of secrets, sponsor of little Mr Mozart, patron and critic, supplier of the latest Parisian thoughts and notions to all the finest European gentry – than a deal is dealt. Grimm has only to drop one of his graceful, witty, superbly well-informed notes to his old and no less widely travelled friend, Baron-General Ivan Ivanovitch Betskoi of Sankt Peterburg. He serves the great Tzarina as chamberlain, court adviser, purchase-master, and – at least according to one of the innumerable gross rumours that surround her – her mother’s lover, and he depends for his cunning political insight on the wit and wisdom of Melchior Grimm. Betskoi recommends, of course. ‘Buy,’ he then whispers in the Empress’s ear, ‘it will show you are a lover of reason and everyone will admire you for it. Especially the French.’
    But the great lady is, as always,