Is the enlightenment works’ editorship still needed?

The paper asks whether editing of 18th-century texts is still needed. By answering this question, she tracks the changes in editing on the example of Polish research on the Enlightenment. On the one hand, it shows how vital classical editing of the 20th century was: publishing volumes of collected works, correspondence, poetry, anthologies – types of editions whose development peaked in Poland in the communist era when cultural policy financially supported scientific editions in order to use them for ideological goals. On the other hand, the author points out how much the demand for critical editions has changed in modern times, especially in the field of humanistic themes and turns, i.e., gender studies and women’s journals, in which the author of the paper specialises (intimate women’s journals of the 18th and 19th centuries). The paper also deals with the digitisation of sources and scientific editions. The author recognises the advantages of this digitisation challenge and points to its rarely discussed limitations. The conclusion emphasises the importance of scientific anthologies and the editorship itself, which enables direct contact with the text and its more profound understanding, especially in order to understand tradition and the present day.