Brilliant, original, funny and moving -- a vivid portrait of
Montaigne, showing how his ideas gave birth to our modern sense of
our inner selves, from Shakespeare's plays to the dilemmas we face
today.
How to get on well with people, how to deal with violence, how to
adjust to losing someone you love -- such questions arise in most
people's lives. They are all versions of a bigger question: how do
you live? How do you do the good or honourable thing, while
flourishing and feeling happy?
This question obsessed Renaissance writers, none more than Michel
Eyquem de Montaigne (1533-92), perhaps the first truly modern
individual. A nobleman, public official and wine-grower, he wrote
free-roaming explorations of his thought and experience, unlike
anything written before. He called them 'essays', meaning
'attempts' or 'tries'. Into them he put whatever was in his head:
his tastes in wine and food, his childhood memories, the way his
dog's ears twitched when it was dreaming, as well as the appalling
events of the religious civil wars raging around him. The Essays
was an instant bestseller, and over four hundred years later,
Montaigne's honesty and charm still draw people to him. Readers
come to him in search of companionship, wisdom and entertainment --
and in search of themselves.
This book, a spirited and singular biography (and the first full
life of Montaigne in English for nearly fifty years), relates the
story of his life by way of the questions he posed and the answers
he explored. It traces his bizarre upbringing (made to speak only
Latin), youthful career and sexual adventures, his travels, and his
friendships with the scholar and poet Etienne de La Boetie and with
his adopted 'daughter', Marie de Gournay. And as we read, we also
meet his readers -- who for centuries have found in Montaigne an
inexhaustible source of answers to the haunting question, 'how to
live?'
"From the Hardcover edition."
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