Denis Diderot was one of the key figures during Enlightment. He was a French writer, philosopher and art critic. He was “one of the most prominent of the French Enyclopedists” says British Humanist Association. Along with Voltaire, Rousseau, Montesquieu, D’Alembert and other encyclopedists, Didero created ideology of the commons that resulted in The Great French Revolution (1789-1793).
He was a great thinker whose ideas and actions brought him to being a co-founder of Encyclopedie. Although Diderot got his mass recognition from the Encyclopedie, he was also the author of other creative works that were full of fresh ideas. Not only that, Diderot had a great influence on theatre, as he was an author of several successful sentimental plays, where he announced principles of a new drama. Thereby, I believe Diderot is one of the key figures of Enlightenment: a great philosopher that changed the society he lived in and led to the society we live in right now. I am certain that in order to fully understand a period of history you need to go to the primary source. Diderot, being a prominent figure of the 19th century, is a great source of knowledge, experience and ideas of that historical period.
Background…show more content… His mother Angelique Vigneron (1677-1748) was daughter of a skinner and his father Didier Diderot was a cutler. Young Denis was being prepared for a religious career by beginning his education at a Jesuit college in Langres from 1723 to 1728 and became an abbat in 1726. Throughout this period he was very religious. He would fast and wear cilice. In 1732 Denis Diderot earned the Master of Arts degree in philosophy. Then he entered the College d’Harcourt. In 1732 he got a masters degree in the Art major at the Paris University, thinking of becoming a lawyer (British Humanist