Dr Ruggero Sciuto

Dr Ruggero Sciuto (BA, Pisa – MPhil, DPhil, Oxford) is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages in association with St Edmund Hall. His research focuses on eighteenth-century French literature and philosophy, especially the works of Denis Diderot and Paul Thiry d’Holbach, and on diplomatic relations between European countries in the Early Modern Period. He is the author of a monograph on the theory of determinism jointly advanced by Diderot and d’Holbach, and is currently working on a new book project examining how d’Holbach’s elusive practices of authorship and the consequent absence of a well-defined textual corpus influenced the reception of his ideas during the French Revolution. Ruggero has published in premier journals, including the Revue d’Histoire Littéraire de la France and Archivio Storico Italiano, and he is a collaborator on both the Oxford edition of the Complete Works of Voltaire and the Edizione Nazionale del Carteggio di Lodovico Antonio Muratori. He is the director of Digital d’Holbach, a born-digital scholarly edition of d’Holbach’s complete works, and as part of this project he is currently working on editions of two key Enlightenment texts: the Lettres à Eugénie and Le Bon Sens.

Publications

(1) Books

• Sciuto, Determinism and Enlightenment: The Collaboration of Diderot and d’Holbach, in the Oxford University Studies in the Enlightenment series, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2023.

(2) Volumes edited

• Sciuto (ed), New Approaches to d’Holbach’s Système de la nature (under contract with Brill – full manuscript to be submitted by the end of 2024);
• Sciuto (ed.), Volume 17 dell’Edizione Nazionale del Carteggio di Lodovico Antonio Muratori (Carteggi con Fabiani…Filicaja), Firenze: Olschki (in progress);
• Sciuto and F. Kühnel (eds.), Gender and Diplomacy in the Early Modern Period, special issue of the International History Review, 44:5 (2022), p.940-1075.

(3) Book-length editions

• Paul Thiry d’Holbach, Le Bon Sens, ou Idées naturelles opposées aux idées surnaturelles, ed. by R. Sciuto (in progress);
• Paul Thiry d’Holbach, Lettres à Eugénie, ou Préservatif contre les préjugés, ed. by R. Sciuto (in progress).

(4) Articles and book chapters

• Sciuto, ‘Emilie Du Châtelet and the Three Leibnizian Versions of the Principle of Sufficient Reason’ (in progress);
• Sciuto, ‘Fighting or Reflecting the Light? Jacob Vernes’s Confidence philosophique’ (in progress – to be submitted to Brill by the end of 2024);
• Sciuto, ‘Diderot, d’Holbach, and American Freethought (ca. 1825-1850)’ (in progress – to be submitted to Diderot Studies by the end of June 2024);
• Sciuto, ‘Picturing women atheists in eighteenth-century Paris: d’Holbach’s Lettres à Eugénie and Diderot’s Entretien d’un philosophe avec la maréchale de ***’ (submitted to French Studies in September 2023);
• Sciuto, ‘D’Holbach’s Enchanted Materialism’, in Charles T. Wolfe and John Symons (eds), History and Philosophy of Materialism (submitted in February 2024; under contract with Routledge);
• Sciuto, ‘Voltaire’s and François de Bussy’s Représentation aux Etats de l’Empire: The Emergence of Enlightenment Diplomacy’ (submitted to Etudes sur le Dix-Huitième Siècle in May 2023);
• Sciuto, ‘More of the Same: D’Holbach and the Temptation of Self-Quotation’ (forthcoming in Modern Languages Open in 2024);
• Sciuto, ‘Voltaire philosophe : un architecte de la pensée’ (forthcoming in the Revue Voltaire in 2024);
• Sciuto, ‘Cui prodest? Acteurs et bénéficiaires de la diplomatie culturelle au miroir de la correspondance du résident de France à Florence, Luigi Lorenzi’, in V. Martin and G. Montègre (eds), Une diplomatie des mobilités. Négocier « l’étranger » dans l’Europe moderne (XVIe-XVIIIe siècle), Rome: Ecole Française de Rome, p.169-183 (forthcoming in 2024);
• Sciuto, ‘« Un tout lié, dont les parties ont une correspondance nécessaire » : l’édition numérique de d’Holbach’, in Dix-Huitième Siècle, 55 (2023), p.503-511;
• Sciuto, ‘Ideas in Action: Franco Venturi’s Settecento’, in N. Cronk and E. Décultot (eds), Inventions of Enlightenment since 1800, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2023, p.241-256;
• Sciuto, ‘Bringing together the Essay and the Second Treatise: d’Holbach Interpreter of Locke’, in Studi Lockiani. Ricerche sull’età moderna, 3 (2022), p.61-86;
• Sciuto and F. Kühnel, ‘Introduction’, in Sciuto and F. Kühnel (eds), Gender and Diplomacy in the Early Modern Period, special issue of the International History Review, 44:5 (2022), p.943-951;
• Sciuto, ‘The Correspondence(s) of Count and Countess Lorenzi: What Was the Extent of an Early Modern Ambassadress’ Autonomy?‘, in Sciuto and F. Kühnel (eds), Gender and Diplomacy in the Early Modern Period, special issue of the International History Review, 44:5 (2022), p.1021-1034;
• Sciuto, ‘The Absent Guest: D’Holbach’s Strategic Use of Voltaire’s Texts’, in L. Nicolì (ed.), The Great Protector of Wits. Baron d’Holbach and his Time, Leiden: Brill, 2022, p.116-134;
• Sciuto, ‘Voltaire, l’Arioste, et le genre littéraire de La Pucelle’, Revue Voltaire, 21 (2022), p.147-162;
• Sciuto, ‘A ‘Reversible Figure Annotation System’ for the Born-Digital Critical Edition of d’Holbach’s Complete Works’, in Julia Nantke and Frederik Schlupkothen (eds.), Annotation in Scholarly Editions and Research: Function, Differentiation, Systematization, Berlin: De Gruyter, 2020, p.373-389;
• Sciuto, ‘Démarches secrètes de l’abbé Trublet pour devenir Immortel’, La Lettre clandestine, 28 (2020), p.241-253;
• Sciuto, ‘Reti diplomatiche al servizio del progresso scientifico: Luigi Lorenzi e l’inoculazione antivaiolosa nella Toscana granducale’, Chroniques italiennes, 37 (2019), p.283-301;
• Sciuto, ‘Voltaire et Johann Baptist Anton von Pergen’, Revue d’Histoire Littéraire de la France, 118 (2018), p.165-176;
• Sciuto, ‘The duc de Richelieu, Voltaire, and Mme du Barry: an Unpublished Letter from the Cabinet noir (D18516a)’, Revue Voltaire, 17 (2017), p.309-314;
• Sciuto, ‘The Correspondence of André Morellet: Seven Unpublished Letters to Luigi Lorenzi (1758-1765)’, Archivio Storico Italiano, 174 (2016), p.499-522;
• Sciuto, ‘L’imbarazzo del Naturalista e del Metafisico: Voltaire e le implicazioni filosofiche di un esperimento condotto da Lazzaro Spallanzani sulla rigenerazione della testa delle lumache terrestri’, in Nel nome di Lazzaro. Saggi di storia della scienza e delle istituzioni scientifiche tra il XVII e il XVIII secolo, Bologna: Pendragon, 2014, p.245-258.

(5) Texts edited (either digitally or in print)

• Voltaire, ‘Continuation du même sujet; Que les philosophes ne peuvent jamais nuire’, ed. by R. Sciuto, in Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire, vol. 6B (Lettres sur les anglais), Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2020, p.391-421;
• Voltaire, ‘De Newton’, ed. by R. Sciuto, in Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire, vol. 6B (Lettres sur les anglais), Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2020, p.443-457;
• Voltaire, ‘Histoire de l’infini’, ed. by R. Sciuto, in Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire, vol. 6B (Lettres sur les anglais), Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2020, p.459-475;
• Voltaire, Représentation aux Etats de l’Empire, ed. by R. Sciuto, in Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire, vol. 29B, Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2020, p.427-478;
• Voltaire, Dialogue entre un brahmane et un jésuite sur la nécessité et l’enchaînement des choses, ed. by R. Sciuto, Oxford: Taylorian Institution, 2019;
• Voltaire, ‘Réponse à Monsieur le Duc de Bouillon’, ed. by R. Sciuto and Christophe Paillard, in Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire, vol. 78B (Commentaire Historique sur les Œuvres de l’Auteur de La Henriade), Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2018, p.181-186;
• M. de La Condamine, Les Quand adressés au Sr Palissot, ed. by R. Sciuto, in Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire, vol. 51A (Recueil des facéties parisiennes), Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2015, p.407-422.

(6) Databases

• Sciuto, A List of Editions of d’Holbach’s Works, published on the Voltaire Foundation website in September 2021;
• Sciuto, Paul Thiry d’Holbach: A Selected Bibliography, published on the Voltaire Foundation website in February 2021;
• Sciuto and Gladstone, Tout d’Holbach, March 2020;
• Sciuto, Metadata of the correspondence of Paul-Henri Thiry d’Holbach, Early Modern Letters Online, June 2019;
• Contributed several entries to the EpistEur Database (Università di Padova).

(7) Book reviews

• Sciuto, ‘Review of Claude Buffier, Traité des premières vérités, ed. by Louis Rouquayrol, Paris: Vrin, 2020’, French Studies (published online on 7 April 2022);
• Sciuto, ‘Review of Gerhardt Stenger et al. (eds.), Œuvres complètes d’Helvétius, t.III (Poésies, Recueil de notes, Correspondance), Paris: Champion, 2020’, French Studies, 76, 1 (2022), p.118;
• Sciuto, ‘Review of Charles T. Wolfe, Lire le matérialisme, Lyon: ENS éditions, 2020’, French Studies, 75, 3 (2021), p.393-394;
• Sciuto, ‘Review of Antonio Gurrado, La religione dominante: Voltaire e le implicazioni politiche della teocrazia ebraica, Catanzaro: Rubbettino, 2018’, Revue Voltaire, 19 (2019), p.207-210;
• Sciuto, ‘Review of Jeroom Vercruysse, Bibliographie descriptive des imprimés du baron d’Holbach, Paris: Garnier, 2017’, French Studies, 73, 1 (2019), p.118-119;
• Sciuto, ‘Review of Fougeret de Monbron, Margot la ravaudeuse, edited and translated by E. Langille, Cambridge: The Modern Humanities Research Association, 2015’, French Studies, 70, 4 (2016), p.599-600.

(8) Encyclopaedia articles

• Sciuto, ‘Baron d’Holbach’, The Literary Encyclopedia, vol. 1.5.2.04: Eighteenth-Century French Writing and Culture: The Enlightenment, 1700-1800, 12 April 2021.

(9) Other publications

• contributed four unpublished letters to the Edizione Nazionale delle Opere di Ruggiero Giuseppe Boscovich, Milan: 2008-;
• contributed one unpublished letter to the Edizione Nazionale del Carteggio di Lodovico Antonio Muratori;
• translated the articles ‘Gibel’, ‘Palerme’, and ‘Suffisante Raison. Principe de la Raison Suffisante’, for The Encyclopedia of Diderot and d’Alembert Collaborative Translation Project;
• contributed four blog entries (‘Voltaire and the La Barre Affair’, ‘The Représentation aux Etats de l’Empire: a New Addition to the Œuvres complètes de Voltaire’, ‘A born-digital edition of Voltaire’s Dialogue entre un brahmane et un jésuite’, and ‘Digital d’Holbach’) to the Voltaire Foundation Blog.

Conference and seminar presentations

(1) Invited lectures

• ‘« Fi! l[a] vilain[e] hypocrite »: picturing women atheists in eighteenth-century Paris’ – Enlightenment Workshop, Magdalen College, Oxford, United Kingdom, 25 January 2023;
• ‘Digital d’Holbach: Understanding the Radical Enlightenment in an Age of Obscurantism’ – St Edmund Hall Lunchtime Lectures, St Edmund Hall, Oxford, United Kingdom, 11 March 2022;
• ‘Hiding between the lines: God, causation, and laws of nature in the works of the baron d’Holbach’ – All Souls Seminars on Early Modern Intellectual History, All Souls, Oxford, United Kingdom, 4 May 2021;
• ‘A la base de toute édition de correspondance : l’établissement du corpus épistolaire (Réflexions préalables à l’édition numérique de la correspondance de Paul Thiry d’Holbach)’ – Séminaire du Labex OBVIL, Sorbonne Université, Paris, France, 5 February 2020;
• ‘The Christian Roots of d’Holbach’s Atheism’ – USC Francophone Research & Resource Center, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, U.S.A., 16 January 2019;
• ‘Emilie Du Châtelet and the Three Leibnizian Versions of the Principle of Sufficient Reason’ – Forschungskolloquien “History of Women Philosophers and Scientists”, Paderborn, Germany, 27 June 2017;
• ‘Diderot and d’Holbach on Causal Necessitation’ – Besterman Enlightenment Workshop, Voltaire Foundation, Oxford, United Kingdom, 16 January 2017.

(2) Invited presentations

• ‘From Utopia to Reality and Back: Le Tombeau du despotisme ministériel and d’Holbach’s Morale universelle’ – Legacies of Enlightenment: Postdoc Symposium, New College, Oxford, 21-22 June 2023;
• ‘Ideas in Action: The Venturi Antidote’ – Inventions of Enlightenment: The Emergence and use of the concepts of Lumières, Enlightenment, and Aufklärung between 1800 and 1980, Online conference organised by Nicholas Cronk (University of Oxford) and Elisabeth Décultot (University of Halle-Wittenberg), 18 and 25 October and 15 November 2021;
• ‘Diplomazia, mercato librario, e libera circolazione: Luigi Lorenzi e la creazione dell’identità europea’ – La diplomatie des mobilités culturelles : Normes, pratiques et protagonistes (XVe – XIXe siècle), Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Madrid, Spain, 21-22 November 2019.

(3) Other presentations

• ‘D’Holbach’s Correspondence and the Future of (Radical) Enlightenment Studies’ – 2024 Conference of the Western Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, San Francisco, 16-17 February 2024;
• ‘Roman Haruspicy and Holistic Weltanschauung: A Threat to Diderot’s Determinism?’ – 16th International Conference of the International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Rome, 3-7 July 2023;
• ‘La Représentation aux Etats de l’Empire de Voltaire et François de Bussy, ou l’Emergence de la diplomatie des Lumières’ – 16th International Conference of the International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Rome, 3-7 July 2023;
• ‘Digital d’Holbach’ – Digitising Enlightenment V – Vers l’interopérabilité des bases de textes, Montpellier, 6-8 July 2022;
• ‘Ame des bêtes, immortalité, matière pensante/matière pensante, âme des bêtes, immortalité : Voltaire jongleur philosophe’ – Journées Voltaire, Paris, 9-10 June 2022;
• ‘Fighting or Reflecting the Light? Jacob Vernes’s Confidence philosophique’ – New Approaches to d’Holbach’s Système de la nature. Online conference organised by R. Sciuto, 14-15 March 2022;
• ‘Voltaire’s and François de Bussy’s Représentation aux Etats de l’Empire: The Emergence of Enlightenment Diplomacy’ – Errors in Early Modern Diplomacy. Online conference organised by R. Sciuto and T. Sowerby (University of Oxford), 10-11 November 2021;
• ‘Intimacy and Frequency of Contact in Concentric Multimedia Ego Networks: The Epistolary and Social Networks of Paul Thiry d’Holbach’ – Networking Archives Colloquium, Oxford, 14-15 September 2020;
• ‘Diplomatic Correspondences at the Crossroads of Local and Supranational Enlightenment’ – 15th International Conference of the International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Edinburgh, 14-19 July 2019;
• ‘Towards a born-digital edition of d’Holbach’s complete works: Challenges and opportunities’ – 15th International Conference of the International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Edinburgh, 14-19 July 2019;
• ‘L’académicien Trublet témoin de la vie intellectuelle de son temps: sa correspondance avec Luigi Lorenzi’ – Pensées secrètes des académiciens: Fontenelle et ses confrères, Paris (France), 27-29 June 2019;
• ‘The Absent Guest: D’Holbach’s Strategic Usage of Voltaire’s Texts’ – The great protector of wits. D’Holbach 1789-2019, Göttingen (Germany), 9-11 May 2019;
• ‘Diplomatic Network and the Progress of Scientific Knowledge: Luigi Lorenzi and the diffusion of the practice of smallpox inoculation in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany’ – TORCH Network on Diplomacy in the Early Modern Period (1400-1800), Oxford, 6 November 2018;
• ‘Mr and Mrs Lorenzi: One or Two Correspondences?’ – Diplomacy and Gender in the Early Modern World (1400-1800), Oxford, 11-12 June 2018;
• ‘Luigi Lorenzi e Charles Marie de La Condamine: analisi di un carteggio (1755-1765)’ – La Diplomatie des lettres au XVIIIe siècle – Joint Conference of the Société Française d’Etude du Dix-Huitième Siècle and the Società Italiana di Studi sul Secolo XVIII, Paris, 7-9 December 2017;
• ‘Ambasciatori e ministri residenti nella Repubblica delle Lettere: il caso Lorenzi (1705-1766)’ – Interim Conference of the Society for Italian Studies, Trinity College, Dublin, 29-30 April 2016;
• ‘Does Madness Represent a Threat in a Deterministic Universe? Diderot and d’Holbach Answer’ – Oxford French Graduate Seminar, All Souls College, Oxford, 26 April 2016;
• ‘A New Work by Voltaire: the Représentation aux Etats de l’Empire’ – 45th Annual Conference of the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, St. Hugh’s College, Oxford, 7 January 2016;
• ‘The Principle of Sufficient Reason, Emilie du Châtelet and… an anonymous Encyclopédiste’ – Emilie du Châtelet Study Day, Ertegun House, Oxford, 14 May 2015;
• ‘Causation in Eighteenth-Century France (How-to)’ – Early Modern French Seminar: Graduate Research Showcase, Maison Française d’Oxford, Oxford, 19 February 2015;
• ‘The La Condamine-Lorenzi Correspondence and other Unpublished Letters found in the National Archives in Florence’ – Enlightenment Correspondences Network, Ertegun House, Oxford, 29 January 2015;
• ‘Universalism and Particularism in d’Holbach’s Système de la Nature’ – 44th Annual Conference of the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, St. Hugh’s College, Oxford, 8 January 2015;
• ‘Voltaire e Lazzaro Spallanzani: nuove direttive di ricerca’ – Book launch of Nel nome di Lazzaro. Saggi di storia della scienza e delle istituzioni scientifiche tra il XVII e il XVIII secolo, Bologna: Pendragon, 2014, Scandiano (Reggio Emilia), 28 November 2014;
• ‘On the permeability of both the categories of Antiquity and Modernity in Leopardi’s thought’ – Post-Graduate Training Programme in Italian Studies, School of Advanced Studies, London, 29 November 2013.

Events organised

(1) Conference

• New Approaches to d’Holbach’s Système de la nature – Oxford, Maison Française d’Oxford, 14-15 March 2022;
• Errors in Early Modern Diplomacy – Virtual conference organised with Dr Tracey Sowerby, 10-11 November 2021;
• Diplomacy and Gender in the Early Modern World (1400-1800). Oxford, Radcliffe Humanities Building, 11-12 June 2018.

(2) Seminar

• Leverhulme Seminars on the Radical Enlightenment. Convenor, November 2020-2023;
• TORCH Network on Diplomacy in the Early Modern Period (1400-1800). Convenor (then co-convener with Dr Tracey Sowerby), July 2017-2023.

(3) Panels

• Eighteenth-Century Radical Thinkers and Greco-Roman Religion and Mythology – 16th ISECS Congress, Rome, 3-7 July 2023;
• Celebrating the Completion of the Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire (1968-2021) and the Beginning of New Digital Scholarly Edition of Voltaire and d’Holbach – 50^th BSECS Annual Conference, Online conference, 6-8 January 2021.