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During the early modern period the public postal
systems became central pillars of the emerging public
sphere. Despite the importance of the post in the
transformation of communication, commerce and
culture, little has been known about the functioning of
the post or how it affected the lives of its users and their
societies. In Postal culture in Europe, 1500-1800, Jay Caplan
provides the first historical and cultural analysis of the
practical conditions of letter-exchange at the dawn of
the modern age.
Caplan opens his analysis by exploring the economic,
political, social and existential interests that were
invested in the postal service, and traces the history of
the three main European postal systems of the era, the
Thurn and Taxis, the French Royal Post and the British
Post Office. He then explores how the post worked, from
the folding and sealing of letters to their collection,
sorting, and transportation. Beyond providing service
to the general public, these systems also furnished early
modern states with substantial revenue and effective
surveillance tools in the form of the Black Cabinets or
Black Chambers. Caplan explains how postal services
highlighted the tension between state power and the
emerging concept of the free individual, with rights to
private communication outside the public sphere. Postal
systems therefore affected how letter writers and readers
conceived and expressed themselves as individuals,
which the author demonstrates through an examination
of the correspondence of Voltaire and Rousseau, not
merely as texts but as communicative acts.
In this book Jay Caplan provides readers with both a
comprehensive overview of the changes wrought by the
newly public postal system, and a thought-provoking
account of the expectations that have led to our culture
of instant communication.
