Dissertation Research: Christiaan Huygens: The Construction of Texts and Audiences

本论文的研究项目主要有两个目标。第一个是通过考察克里斯蒂安·惠更斯(1629-1695)的出版实践，对他的职业生涯进行仔细的考察。惠更斯是17世纪的核心人物；因此，更好地了解他的职业生涯，以及它是如何跨越智力、社会和政治界限发展的，将极大地促进这一时期的科学史。通过分发演示文稿，观察与他分享其作品的个人，该项目将跟踪惠更斯从一个同行团体到另一个同行团体的过渡和运动，包括伦敦皇家学会和法国皇家学院。这不仅将阐明惠更斯的智力和社会迁移，更广泛地说，它将揭示许多关于自然哲学在这一时期是如何发挥作用的。该项目的第二个目的是以惠更斯的职业生涯为例，了解如何分发献礼文本，以及在赠送这种礼物时采取了哪些策略。现存的通信记录了惠更斯为他的大部分作品选择的收信人，以及许多收信人的信件。这些名单将为惠更斯的每一部作品进行审查，获奖者将进行评估和比较，以试图了解他的目标受众是什么。惠更斯并不是唯一一个努力通过谨慎的发行模式为他的书建立受众的人。因此，他的努力将被与那个时期的其他人进行比较，包括第谷·布拉赫、伽利略和牛顿。由此，对献词文本的各种作用会有一个更全面的认识。

There are two primary goals for this dissertation research project. The first is to provide a close examination of the career of Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695) by looking at his publication practices. Huygens was a central figure in the seventeenth century; therefore, a better understanding of his career, and how it developed across intellectual, social and political lines, would significantly add to the history of science in this period. By looking at the individuals with whom he shared his work through the circulation of presentation copies, this project will follow the transitions and movements Huygens made from one peer group to another, including the Royal Society of London, and the French Royal Academy. Not only will this elucidate Huygens' intellectual and social migrations, but more generally it will reveal a great deal about how natural philosophy functioned in this period. The second aim of this project is to use Huygens' career as a case study for understanding how dedicatory copies of texts could be distributed, and what strategies were involved in the presentation of such gifts. Correspondence exists which records the recipients Huygens selected for most of his works, and letters from many recipients are extant as well. These lists will be examined for each of Huygens' works, and the recipients evaluated and compared in an attempt to understand what audiences he was targeting. Huygens was not alone in his efforts to construct audiences for his books through careful distribution patterns. Thus, his efforts will be compared to others from the period, including Tycho Brahe, Galileo and Newton. From this a more complete picture of the various roles of dedicatory texts will emerge.