Denis Diderot (1713–1784) was a philosopher, writer and art critic, and one of the leading voices of the French Enlightenment. Born in Langres as the son of a master cutler, he studied in Paris and long scraped by as a translator and tutor. His Letter on the Blind earned him three months' imprisonment in Vincennes in 1749. For more than twenty years – initially together with d'Alembert – he edited the Encyclopédie, the great dictionary of the Enlightenment, against censorship and bans. Alongside it he wrote plays, novels and art criticism. His boldest books – Jacques the Fatalist, The Nun, D'Alembert's Dream and Rameau's Nephew – remained unpublished in his lifetime. To provide his daughter with a dowry he sold his library to Catherine the Great, whom he visited in Saint Petersburg in 1773/74. He died in Paris in 1784.
More about Denis Diderot: Wikipedia · Deutsche Nationalbibliothek · Wikidata
