‘Come poeta che finge, non come filosofo che argomenta’: Italian translations of Fontenelle’s 'Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes' (ca. 1730–1751)

This contribution focusses on specific Italian translations of Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle’s Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes (1686). Its aim is twofold: on the one hand, it offers a comprehensive survey of the translations produced across the Peninsula in the first half of the eighteenth century. On the other, it constitutes a case study in the production of translations as means of transmission of knowledge in the Enlightenment period. After a first section revolving around two early manuscript versions, the second and third sections closely examine two translators: the grammarian in Paris Annibale Antonini (1702–1755) and the Piarist cleric Bernardino Vestrini (1715–1786). Looking at their own works alongside their versions of the Entretiens shows how their respective biographies, intellectual contexts and personal agendas had an impact on their translation practices, leading them to incorporate additional elements in their translations. In so doing, their Italian adaptations proved to be flexible sites of knowledge, able to transmit information distinct from the Cartesian physics of the original text.