Representing Women Atheists in Eighteenth-Century France: D’Holbach’s <i>Lettres à Eugénie</i> and Diderot’s <i>Entretien d’un philosophe avec la maréchale de ***</i>

This article examines the representation of female atheists in two eighteenth-century texts, Paul Thiry d’Holbach’s Lettres à Eugénie and Denis Diderot’s Entretien d’un philosophe avec la maréchale de *** . These two works, I argue, reflect Diderot’s and d’Holbach’s shared effort to incorporate women into their plans for religious and social reform. The two male authors, however, seek to achieve this goal in different ways. Without excluding the possibility of female unbelief independently of male intervention, d’Holbach’s work sets out to promote atheism amongst women by means of (condescending) proselytism. Diderot, by contrast, normalizes women atheists’ existence by means of an elegant dialogue revolving around the notion of hypocrisy. This article accordingly offers a new interpretation of Diderot’s Entretien which will contribute to a reappraisal of his attitudes towards women. At the same time, it aims to foster discussion of the representation of gender in the works of d’Holbach, while also highlighting Diderot’s and d’Holbach’s intellectual proximity.