Montaigne in Motion

by Jean Starobinski, Arthur Goldhammer (Translation)

Educated in the humanities and trained in psychiatry, Jean Starobinski is a central figure in the Geneva School of criticism. His classic work, Montaigne in Motion, is a subtly conceived and elegantly written study of the Essais of Montaigne, whose deceptively plainspoken meditations have entranced readers and stimulated philosophers since their first publication in 1580 and 1595.

Here Starobinski offers a decidedly postmodern reading of Montaigne. In chapters dealing with the themes of public and private life, friendship, death, the body, and love, Starobinski reveals much that will remind us that Montaigne’s thought is as apropos to our time as it was to his own.

“The most important contribution to Montaigne studies since Friedrich’s work . . . . [It] will be the critical framework in which scholars will discuss Montaigne in the years to come.”—Choice

 

“Starobinski brings Montaigne to life by treating him as our contemporary and asking him modern questions.”—Hudson Review

 

Genres: Nonfiction

360 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

About the author

Jean Starobinski studied classical literature, and then medicine at the University of Geneva, and graduated from that school with a doctorate in letters (docteur ès lettres) and in medicine. He taught French literature at the Johns Hopkins University, the University of Basel and at the University of Geneva, where he also taught courses in the history of ideas and the history of medicine.

His existential and phenomenological literary criticism is sometimes grouped with the so-called "Geneva School". He has written landmark works on French literature of the 18th century – including works on the writers Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Denis Diderot, Voltaire – and also on authors of other periods (such as Michel de Montaigne). He has also written on contemporary poetry, art, and the problems of interpretation. His books have been translated in dozens of languages.

His knowledge of medicine and psychiatry brought him to study the history of melancholia (notably in the Trois Fureurs, 1974). He was the first scholar to publish work (in 1964) on Ferdinand de Saussure's study of anagrams.

Jean Starobinski is a member of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques (a component of the Institut de France) and other French, European and American learned academies. He has honorary degrees (honoris causa) from numerous universities in Europe and America.

Reviews

[Tijana]

"Montenj u kretanju" je standardno dobar Starobinski tj. vrlo ozbiljno (i na mahove šarmantno) fenomenološko čitanje Montenja, dušu dalo za onog ko to voli. Opomena: prevod vrlo rđav, na mahove gotovo nečitljiv, a za nas nepametne koji ionako svaku rečenicu moramo po tri puta da čitamo dodatna muka.

[Larry]

Beautiful prose, empty thought. And i could have done without that whiny, whingeing sort of cringe rightwing bullshit about Montaigne’s “politics” (if you want to call it that) at the end.

[Mazgai]

This is a book which you will love it or hate it.

As you see, I love it. It is a book which I need to read to go deep in Montaigne’s essays even I don’t agree with all Starobinski’s thoughts and thesis. Reading it is like a wandering in the strange forest, it needs time, free mind (how to be free when you have to work?), and openness to strange ideas and connotations.

[Jenny Maria]

Den här boken har inspirerat mig väldans.