Classiques Garnier Numérique

The publishing house Classiques Garnier was established in 1833 to provide edited editions of classical, French, and worldwide literature. Series of critical essays in the humanities and social sciences were introduced in 1896. The first electronic content was offered in 1985, with a new series of electronic editions launched in 1998. Online resources available currently from Classiques Garnier Numérique include databases of primary source texts, classic works of criticism, and dictionaries. The publisher notes two main categories of resources, which include the following titles:

I. Databases of content from the Middle Ages to the present day

• Grand Corpus des dictionnaires de langue française, du IX^e au XX^e siècle (24 important dictionaries ranging from Old French to the dictionary of the French Academy)
• Encyclopédie d’Yverdon (Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des connaissances humaines)
• Grand Corpus des littératures française et francophone du Moyen Âge au XX^e siècle (four literary corpora covering more than 300 authors: Medieval literature from the origins to the 15th century; Narrative literature from the Middle Ages to the 20th century; Francophone literature from sub-Saharan Africa from the origins to independence; and Francophone literature from the Indian Ocean from the origins to independence.)
• La Critique littéraire, le XIX^e siècle
• Les Écrits sur l’art, du XVIII^e au XX^e siècle
• La Révolution et l’Empire, par les écrivains et historiens du XIX^e siècle
• Patrologia graeca (compilation of Greek Church Fathers up to 1478 by Jacques-Paul Migne)

 II. Editorial backlists (monographic series)

• Montaigne Studies
• Studies and Essays on the Renaissance
• Renaissance Literary Library – 3d series
• World Geographies
• Conferences, Congresses, Colloquia on the European Renaissance
• International Society of Interdisciplinary Studies on the Renaissance (S.I.R.I.R.)
• Renaissance Texts

A recently issued title is the compilation Grand Corpus des grammaires françaises, des remarques et des traités sur la langue (XV^e-XVII^e siecles). The complete works of Montaigne as well as Pierre Bayles are newly available online.

All of the monographic series from Classiques Garnier are issued in both hard copy and as online electronic resources. Some of the databases are also issued on CD-ROM or DVD. Page image facsimiles are being added to databases that previously only offered full text.

Editorial Policy

A publishing committee selects editions for inclusion in the various literary corpora. According to the publisher, works issued by Classiques Garnier Numerique are presented according to three criteria of electronic text editing or “numerical philology” as defined by literature professor Claude Blum of the Sorbonne: coherent inclusiveness (ideally all editions from an author’s lifetime or at least the latest most complete versions); exact reproduction of the original format including page numbering; and linking of full text to page image facsimiles. Blum edited the Classiques Garnier edition of Montaigne’s work, which has been described as a collection of editions (from 1580, 1582, 1587, and 1588) lacking an interface for critical comparison of multiple versions.[1]