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On the Dialogic Impulse in the Genesis of Montaigne's Essais

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Robert F. Jones
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Extract

One of the big problems in Montaigne studies is that the essayist slips away the minute he is pressed too closely. Careful collation of passages, meticulously chosen with a specific end in mind, can ‘prove’ a given thesis: Montaigne the Stoic, Montaigne the Skeptic, or Montaigne the Epicurean. It can be shown—and has been—that these three aspects were all true, simply superseding each other as Montaigne grew older. It has also been shown, however, that Montaigne the Stoic and Montaigne the Epicurean coexisted; and other combinations likewise. So pressing Montaigne too closely is likely to yield a series of pictures which, viewed individually, are true, but taken as a whole appear contradictory.

Type
Research Article
Information
Renaissance Quarterly , Volume 30 , Issue 2 , Summer 1977 , pp. 172 - 180
Copyright
Copyright © Renaissance Society of America 1977

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References

1 Oeuvres complètes (Paris: Gallimard, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1962), Bk. III, ch. 3, p. 801. All subsequent references to this work will be incorporated in the text. The roman numerals refer to Books of the Essais; the arabic, to chapters and pages.

2 ‘… faisant le cheval eschappe, mon esprit se donne cent fois plus d'affaire à soymesmes, qu'il n'en prenoit pour autruy’ (1,8,34).

3 Montaigne tells us he did this with portraits he had of himself: ‘J’ay des portraits de ma forme de vingt et cinq et de trente cinq ans; je les compare avec celuy d'asteure: combien de fois ce n'est plus moy!’ (III,13,1082).

4 Thibaudet would seem to concur with this inasmuch as he draws an interesting corollary between Montaigne and the paper he writes on, the paper being ‘his interlocutor': ‘Ce qu'il verse sur son papier c'est le succédané de sa mémoire, c'est sa mémoire hors de lui. C'est aussi son interlocuteur,’ Thibaudet, Albert, Montaigne, texte établi par Floyd Gray d'après les notes manuscripts (Paris: Gallimard, 1963), p. 67 Google Scholar.

5 Communications: Concepts and Processes, ed. Joseph A. DeVito (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1971), p. 19.

6 See II,17,631; II,18,649; III,1,768; III,9,971-972.

7 Lanson, Gustave writes, ‘Il avait la passion du bien public,’ Les Essais de Montaigne: étude et analyse (Paris: Mellottée, 1930), p. 20 Google Scholar.

8 Montaigne regrets that Seneca's final words had been lost (we remember that Montaigne carefully gives us those of La Boétie): ‘Ce nous est une bien facheuse perte qu'elles [Seneca's final words] ne soyent venues jusques à nous’ (II,35,728).

9 The Scar of Montaigne (Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1966), p. 8.

10 For typical details, see 1,55,301, and III,9,964.

11 In this connection he says, ‘Je suis affamé de me faire connoistre; et ne me chaut à combien, pourveu que ce soit veritablement’ (III,5,824).

12 For this idea and the quotation which immediately follows, see the article by Anthony Wilden, ‘Par divers moyens on arrive a pareille fin: A Reading of Montaigne,’ Modem Language Notes, 83.3 (May 1968), 582.

13 Zoe Samaras sees Montaigne and his reader as talking companions. ‘Montaigne is constantly preoccupied with his reader; his reader is his only companion with whom he converses endlessly,’ The Comic Element of Montaigne's Style (Paris: Editions A.-G. Nizet, 1970), p. 110.

14 ‘Il y a là une sorte d'embaumement qui conserve la figure de la vie. C'est ainsi que lui a conservé en lui, vivant, La Boétie,’ Thibaudet, Montaigne, p. 54.

15 Villey, Pierre, Les Essais de Michel de Montaigne (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1965), p. 396 Google Scholar.

16 ‘L intérêt de Montaigne pour lui-même ne dégénère en solipsisme. Il reste ouvert au commerce des hommes,’ Hugo Friedrich, Montaigne (Paris: Gallimard, 1968), p. 253.

17 ‘Par divers moyens … ,’ p. 585.