| Summary: | Voltaire’s historical works reflect his own changing roles and preoccupations from conteur to campaigner. His groundbreaking historical output of thirty-eight texts, composed throughout his long career as a writer, is now receiving renewed critical attention. <br/> In the first study to explore the whole range of Voltaire’s writings in this domain, Síofra Pierse looks at the irreducible ambiguity of the term <em>histoire</em>, both factual truth and the way it is represented – ‘history’ and ‘story’. She discusses how Voltaire’s theories of history interact with other, more literary considerations, and analyses how a search for truth overlaps with a desire to create a compelling narrative that engages the reader in a deeper, collaborative, and polemical project. <br/> In <em>Voltaire historiographer: narrative paradigms</em>, Síofra Pierse brings to light how the <em>philosophe</em> exploits the potential of history not simply to record the past, but to influence the present and shape the future. <br/><br/> Acknowledgements<br/> List of abbreviations<br/> Introduction: <em>Historiographerie</em><br/> I. Narrative<br/> 1. The historiographer<br/> 2. The author<br/> 3. The reader<br/> II. Story<br/> 4. Digressions<br/> 5. Heroics<br/> III. Truth<br/> 6. Fact and fable<br/> 7. Truth and doubt<br/> Conclusion: beyond history<br/> Appendix: Corpus summary<br/> Bibliography<br/> Index<br/>
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