Machine Man

Summary

Note on the text

L'Homme machine was first published anonymously by Elie Luzac in Leiden, towards the end of 1747, but dated 1748. Luzac added his own preface justifying the publication of the book. Two other editions, also dated 1748, are listed by Vartanian, and La Mettrie made a final revision of the work for his Philosophical Works in 1750. This last state of the text, used by Vartanian for his critical edition of L'Homme machine, 1960, is the one used for this translation. All editions contain La Mettrie's provocative dedication to Haller, which has been omitted here. The first three editions of the work also contained on the title page five lines of verse from Voltaire's ‘Epitre à Monsieur de Genonville’, which were omitted in 1750. Editions of L'Homme machine were published by J. Assézat in Paris in 1865, and by M. Solovine in 1921, and there have been several cheap modern French editions of the work, the most recent of them with an introduction and notes by P. L. Assoun, Paris, 1981. An English translation, attributing the authorship to the Marquis d'Argens, was published as Man a Machine in London by W. Owen in 1749, and reprinted in 1750 giving the author as La Mettrie; another English translation with the same title, by G. C. Bussey, was published in Chicago by The Open Court in 1912 and reprinted in 1927 and 1943.