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Mother Death: The Journal of Jules Michelet, 1815-1850
Mother Death, selections from the private journal of France's greatest Romantic historian, traces the relationship between the author's personal life and the writing and thinking of history. Jules Michelet's diary explains his ambition to "resurrect the integral life of the past" his motto as visionary historian. As the noted critic Edmund Wilson wrote, "We finally get to feel that Michelet is the human's spirit itself fighting its way through the ages--eduring long degradations, triumphing in the joyful rebirths, contending within itself in devastating and baffled conflicts."
The Journal is a remarkable psychological document that explores the mysteries of bereavement, the artistic urges often inspired by loss, and the historian's philosophical and religious world views. Judiciously selected to form a coherent life story, these vividly translated reflections include the years 1815-1850, from the time his mother died to the death of his infant son. In Mother Death we witness how several crucial losses affected the historian's intimate relationships, his batter for faith through doubt, his ultimate break with the Catholic church, and his emerging identity as historian of the Revolution of 1789.
The Journal is a remarkable psychological document that explores the mysteries of bereavement, the artistic urges often inspired by loss, and the historian's philosophical and religious world views. Judiciously selected to form a coherent life story, these vividly translated reflections include the years 1815-1850, from the time his mother died to the death of his infant son. In Mother Death we witness how several crucial losses affected the historian's intimate relationships, his batter for faith through doubt, his ultimate break with the Catholic church, and his emerging identity as historian of the Revolution of 1789.
284 pages, Hardcover
First published May 1, 1984
33 people want to read
About the author
Jules Michelet
1,160 books102 followersHis father was a master printer, not very prosperous, and Jules assisted him in the actual work of the press. A place was offered him in the imperial printing office, but his father was able to send him to the famous Collège or Lycée Charlemagne, where he distinguished himself. He passed the university examination in 1821, and was soon appointed to a professorship of history in the Collège Rollin.
Soon after this, in 1824, he married. This was one of the most favourable periods ever for scholars and men of letters in France, and Michelet had powerful patrons in Abel-François Villemain and Victor Cousin, among others. Although he was an ardent politician (having from his childhood embraced republicanism and a peculiar variety of romantic free-thought), he was above all a man of letters and an inquirer into the history of the past. His earliest works were school textbooks. Between 1825 and 1827 he produced diverse sketches, chronological tables, etc, of modern history. His précis of the subject, published in 1827, is a sound and careful book, far better than anything that had appeared before it, and written in a sober yet interesting style. In the same year he was appointed maître de conferences at the École normale supérieure. Four years later, in 1831, the Introduction à l'histoire universelle showed a very different style, exhibiting the idiosyncrasy and literary power of the writer to greater advantage, but also displaying, in the words of the Encyclopedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, "the peculiar visionary qualities which made Michelet the most stimulating, but the most untrustworthy (not in facts, which he never consciously falsifies, but in suggestion) of all historians."
Soon after this, in 1824, he married. This was one of the most favourable periods ever for scholars and men of letters in France, and Michelet had powerful patrons in Abel-François Villemain and Victor Cousin, among others. Although he was an ardent politician (having from his childhood embraced republicanism and a peculiar variety of romantic free-thought), he was above all a man of letters and an inquirer into the history of the past. His earliest works were school textbooks. Between 1825 and 1827 he produced diverse sketches, chronological tables, etc, of modern history. His précis of the subject, published in 1827, is a sound and careful book, far better than anything that had appeared before it, and written in a sober yet interesting style. In the same year he was appointed maître de conferences at the École normale supérieure. Four years later, in 1831, the Introduction à l'histoire universelle showed a very different style, exhibiting the idiosyncrasy and literary power of the writer to greater advantage, but also displaying, in the words of the Encyclopedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, "the peculiar visionary qualities which made Michelet the most stimulating, but the most untrustworthy (not in facts, which he never consciously falsifies, but in suggestion) of all historians."
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August 21, 2013
Abstraction of grief into work, self-indulgence of mourning. Michelet's self-absorption is perhaps what comes across the most--he uses the deaths around him to fuel his work, death as muse. Grieving somehow at arm's length. But perhaps it is easy to judge--the selfishness of grief is easy to forget.
The translator's frequent notes get in the way of the journal itself.
The translator's frequent notes get in the way of the journal itself.
Displaying 1 of 1 review