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From the eighteenth century until as recently as World War II, the natural scientist was depicted as a kind of moral superhero: objective, modest, ascetic, and selflessly dedicated to the betterment of humanity. What accounts for the widespread diffusion of this myth?   In Science and Immortality, Charles B. Paul provides a partial explanation. The modern ideology of the scientist as disinterested seeker after truth arose partly through the transformation of an ancient literary form--the commemoration of heroes. In 1699 Bernard de Fontenelle, as Secretary of the Paris Academy of Sciences, inaugurated the tradition of the éloge, or eulogy, in honor of members of the Academy. The moral qualities that had once been attributed to the idealized Stoic philosopher were transferred in the eulogies to the \"natural philosopher,\" or scientist. The over two hundred éloges composed between 1699 and 1791 by Fontenelle and his successors--Mairan, Fouchy, and Condorcet--served as a powerful device for the popularization of science.   It was the intention of the secretaries, though, not only to exhibit the natural scientist as a modern-day hero but also to present a truthful record of scientific activity in France. Paul examines the éloges both as a literary form that used rhetorical and stylistic devises to reconcile these two conflicting goals and as a collective biography of a new breed of savants--one that already contained the seed of the conflict between self-image and reality embedded in the modern scientific enterprise. A unique history of science in eighteenth-century France, Science and Immortality illuminates the record in the éloges of the professionalization of some sciences and the maturation of others, the recognition of their utility to society and the state, and the widening trust in science as the remedy to economic restriction and political absolutism. Paul's thorough catalog of the éloges, extensive bibliography, and translations of representative éloges make this book an essential source for scholars in the field. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1980.

Eulogy delivered at Baldwin’s funeral, along with those by Morrison and Angelou. Published in The LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka Reader, ed. William J. Harris (Berkeley, CA, Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2000), pp. 450–6.

Published in The New York Times, December 20, 1987, Sunday, Late City Final Edition Section 7; Page 30, Column 2; Book Review Desk.

Eulogy delivered at James Baldwin’s funeral. Published in The New York Times, December 20, 1987, Sunday, Late City Final Edition Section 7; Page 29, Column 2; Book Review Desk.

Tracing the journal’s history, Justin A. Joyce introduces the tenth anniversary volume of James Baldwin Review.

In Egyptian popular history and culture, Qasim Amin is often referred to the “father of feminism” or the “liberator of women.” However, this was not always the case. Upon his death in 1908, a different legacy emerged in many early eulogies, speeches, biographical sketches, and commemorations of Amin's life. In this early framing of Amin's legacy, his two most famous books were celebrated in ways that minimized the “woman question” while highlighting other aspects of his reforms and work. This allowed Amin's 1908 contemporaries to overlook the divisiveness of his earlier positions in favor of a new sort of fraternal solidarity—one that served the interests of certain political and intellectual male elites. For many of these writers—with a few notable exceptions—Amin was a quintessential reformer and thinker whose interest in the status of women was important insofar as it spoke to the ethos of his intellectual and political projects, not what it could do for women.

This brief communication is a tribute to the life of Nicola Scopinaro, who died on October 28, 2020. Dr. Scopinaro was an innovative surgeon, a scholar, a pioneer of the metabolic surgery era, a teacher, and one of the most fascinating and original of men.