Lettres persanes was an immediate and durable sensation and was often imitated, but it has been diversely read over time. Until the middle of the twentieth century, it was the "spirit" of the Regency which was largely admired, as well as the caricature in the classical tradition of La Bruyère, Pascal and Fontenelle. No one thought to attach it to the novelistic genre. The Persian side of the story tended to be considered as a fanciful decor, the true interest of the work lying in its factitious "oriental" impressions of French society, along with political and religious satire and critique.
In the 1950s began a new era of studies based on better texts and renewed research. Particularly important were the extensively annotated edition by Paul Vernière for Classiques Garnier, long the standard edition, and the findings of Robert Shackleton regarding its use of Muslim chronology; also new perspectives by Roger Mercier, Roger Laufer, and Pauline Kra, which put new focus on the work's unity and integrated the seraglio into its overall meaning. Others who have followed have looked into the ramifications of epistolary form (Rousset, Laufer, Versini), the structure and meaning of the seraglio (Brady, Singerman), and Usbek's purported contradictions. In recent decades it has been religion (Kra) and especially politics (Ehrard, Goulemot, Benrekassa) which predominate, with a progressive return to the role of the seraglio with all its women and eunuchs (Grosrichard, Goldzink, McAlpin, Starobinski, Delon) or the cultural contrast of Orient and Occident.
