The Francis Bacon Project

Francis Bacon (1561–1626) was a philosopher, parliamentarian, scientist, essayist, lawyer and politician. He wrote extensively, and the aim of this project is to produce a complete critical edition of his works: The Oxford Francis Bacon (http://www.oxfordfrancisbacon.com).

The Oxford Francis Bacon will produce a new 16-volume critical edition of Bacon's works. It aims therefore to replace the great but now outdated Victorian edition produced by Spedding, Ellis and Heath, and for the first time to publish a number of manuscript works unknown to them. In the process we hope to improve and advance critical-editorial techniques at the very highest level; provide brand-new facing-page translations for the edited texts of the Latin works; and reintegrate Bacon’s work into the study of early modern philosophy, science, historiography, legal thought, and literature.

Originally the brainchild of the late Professor Graham Rees, the project now belongs to the British Academy’s portfolio and the work is being carried out by an international team of scholars supported by an advisory board. So far eight volumes have been published – four of which comprise Graham Rees’s revolutionary editions of Bacon’s Latin philosophical writings – and work is proceeding apace on the others. In sum, we aim to transform our knowledge of the Baconian corpus in new and exciting ways that speak to students and scholars across all relevant disciplines.

In addition, as part of the project's overall plan, work is underway to produce a complete edition of his correspondence. Such was the range of Bacon's intellectual interests and his legal and political activities, that this edition of the correspondence is expected to become an indispensable primary source for sixteenth and seventeenth century English/British politics and government, law and jurisprudence, philosophy and literature.