Michel De Montaigne

The Essays of Montaigne (eBook, ePUB)

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

The Essays of Michel de Montaigne cover a wide range of topics and explore his thoughts, his life and learning in written form. The essays are widely regarded as the predecessor of the modern essay: a focused treatment of issues, events and concerns past, present and future. Montaigne wrote in a kind of crafted rhetoric designed to intrigue and involve the reader, sometimes appearing to move in a stream-of-thought from topic to topic and at other times employing a structured style which gives more emphasis to the didactic nature of his work. His arguments are often supported with quotations from Ancient Greek, Latin and Italian texts, which he quotes in the original source. Montaigne's stated goal in his book is to describe man, and especially himself, with utter frankness and honesty ("bonne foi"). He finds the great variety and volatility of human nature to be its most basic features, which resonates to the Renaissance thought about the fragility of humans. According to the scholar Paul Oskar Kristeller, "the writers of the period were keenly aware of the miseries and ills of our earthly existence". A representative quote is "I have never seen a greater monster or miracle than myself." He opposed the conquest of the New World, deploring the suffering it brought upon the natives. He is highly skeptical of confessions obtained under torture, pointing out that such confessions can be made up by the suspect just to escape the torture he is subjected to. In the middle of the section normally entitled "Man's Knowledge Cannot Make Him Good," he wrote that his motto was "What do I know?". The essay on Sebond ostensibly defended Christianity. However, Montaigne eloquently employed many references and quotes from classical Greek and Roman, i.e. non-Christian authors, especially the atomist Lucretius. Montaigne considered marriage necessary for the raising of children, but disliked the strong feelings of romantic love as being detrimental to freedom. One of his quotations is "Marriage is like a cage; one sees the birds outside desperate to get in, and those inside desperate to get out." In education, he favored concrete examples and experience over the teaching of abstract knowledge that is expected to be accepted uncritically. The remarkable modernity of thought apparent in Montaigne's essays, coupled with their sustained popularity, made them arguably the most prominent work in French philosophy until the Enlightenment. Their influence over French education and culture is still strong.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: BookRix
• Erscheinungstermin: 28. Juni 2019
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9783736801547
• Artikelnr.: 54654938

Autorenporträt

Michel de Montaigne was a 16th century French author who developed the essay as a literary genre. His first two books of essays were published in 1580. "A man never speaks of himself without losing something. What he says in his disfavor is always believed, but when he commends himself, he arouses mistrust." Born into a French family of minor nobility on February 28, 1533, Michel de Montaigne held a seat in the Bordeaux parliament. Montaigne retired from public life and began to write a series of philosophical and personal essays in 1571. This writing was the first of its kind, making Montaigne responsible for the establishment of the essay as a literary genre. He died in France on September 13, 1592. Michel Eyquem de Montaigne, generally known as Michel de Montaigne, was born on February 28, 1533, in Château de Montaigne (near Bordeaux, France). Montaigne's wealthy father, Pierre Eyquem de Montaigne, decided to nurture his son's intellectual development by making Latin his first language. Montaigne didn't learn French until he was 6. Montaigne attended the College of Guyenne in Bordeaux. He is then presumed to have studied law in Toulouse before beginning his career at the court of Périgueux. In 1557, Montaigne moved to a seat in the Bordeaux parliament. Montaigne's father died in 1568, shortly after he had asked Montaigne to produce a French translation of Teholgia naturalis (Natural Theology), written by Spanish theologian Raymond Sebond. Montaigne's translation was published in 1569