The Information Master: Jean-Baptiste Colbert's Secret State Intelligence System (Cultures Of Knowledge In The Early Modern World)

Soll's prose is clear, his argument is well-developed, and the extent of his research is impressive. He does something in this book that is rare to see; he provides a truly fresh and unique approach to a well explored subject. Jean-Baptiste Colbert emerged as a figure impossible to separate from seventeenth century European studies. Whether the subject is war, colonialism, economics, or state-craft, Colbert has been a fixture in the historiography since his death. Traditionalists and revisionists, marxists and post-modernists, all manner of methodology has had something to say about Colbert. Soll places constructs an intellectual history of the state with Colbert at the center. The result is fascinating and does not drag on, as a study of this kind easily could. Only complaint with Soll's work is that I would have like to seen more on the colonies- Soll advances an interesting argument about why Colbert didn't collect and archive knowledge from the Atlantic world, but doesn't do too much to develop it.The reason I am giving it 4 instead of 5 stars has nothing to do with Soll's work. The book is cheaply printed. The plastic film on the cover started peeling off by the time I finished the first read-through. The pages look and feel pretty cheap. I'm not sure if his new book is with the same publisher, but if it is I will be getting the ebook edition (or snagging it from the library).

I got my hands on an advance copy of this book, and it is TERRIFIC. The author shows how Colbert consolidated both his own and Louis XIV's power by establishing a "secret sphere" of knowledge, of which libraries and archives were the key components. It is fascinating stuff--and not just for specialists of pre-revolutionary French history (like me). The real story here is how power is wielded and strengthened through the savvy manipulation of information and intelligence; anyone who lived through the George W. Bush presidency will be unable to put THE INFORMATION MASTER down.

Scholarly and well-written -- beautifully developed. I'm not an academic, but I do know quite a bit about this period in history, and I learned a great deal more from this book. I loved reading about Colbert's extensive research system: he would have been right at home in the computer age.A study of Colbert is a massive undertaking: I'm not a scholar, but Soll certainly is. This is a fascinating study.