The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau 3

by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The book narrates the ups and downs of Rousseau and follows his life from streets to stardom. It provides a deep insight into the personality of the philosopher and the vision that got him exiled and persecuted. It relates his pride in his individual existence. The assortment of events and emotions presented here is timeless.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Classics, Memoir, Unfinished

Paperback

First published March 12, 2013

About the author

Genevan philosopher and writer Jean Jacques Rousseau held that society usually corrupts the essentially good individual; his works include The Social Contract and Émile (both 1762).

This important figure in the history contributed to political and moral psychology and influenced later thinkers. Own firmly negative view saw the post-hoc rationalizers of self-interest, apologists for various forms of tyranny, as playing a role in the modern alienation from natural impulse of humanity to compassion. The concern to find a way of preserving human freedom in a world of increasingly dependence for the satisfaction of their needs dominates work. This concerns a material dimension and a more important psychological dimensions. Rousseau a fact that in the modern world, humans come to derive their very sense of self from the opinions as corrosive of freedom and destructive of authenticity. In maturity, he principally explores the first political route, aimed at constructing institutions that allow for the co-existence of equal sovereign citizens in a community; the second route to achieving and protecting freedom, a project for child development and education, fosters autonomy and avoids the development of the most destructive forms of self-interest. Rousseau thinks or the possible co-existence of humans in relations of equality and freedom despite his consistent and overwhelming pessimism that humanity will escape from a dystopia of alienation, oppression, and unfreedom. In addition to contributions, Rousseau acted as a composer, a music theorist, the pioneer of modern autobiography, a novelist, and a botanist. Appreciation of the wonders of nature and his stress on the importance of emotion made Rousseau an influence on and anticipator of the romantic movement. To a very large extent, the interests and concerns that mark his work also inform these other activities, and contributions of Rousseau in ostensibly other fields often serve to illuminate his commitments and arguments.

Reviews

[Mohamad Alslyty · Rating 4 out of 5]

سيرة حياة روسو من ١٧٤٢ الة ١٧٥٦.. فيها الكثير من الكلام والأحداث، سيتعرف عليها من يقرأ الجزء هذا..

[Bogdan Liviu · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Intrăm în luptă când ne naştem şi o părăsim când murim. La ce bun să înveţi să-ţi conduci mai bine căruţa când ai ajuns la capătul drumului? Nu-ţi mai rămâne atunci decât să te gândeşti cum să cobori din ea. Studiul cel mai potrivit pentru un moşneag, dacă mai are când, e numai şi numai să înveţe a muri, şi tocmai acest studiu se practică cel mai puţin la vârsta mea; la toate te gândeşti, afară de asta. Toţi bătrânii ţin la viaţă mai mult decât copiii şi o părăsesc mai anevoie decât tinerii. Asta fiindcă toată truda le-a fost îndreptată spre viaţă, iar la capătul ei îşi dau seama că osteneala le-a fost zadarnică." După ce-am călătorit prin cele trei volume ale confesiunilor lui Rousseau, nu pot concluziona decât citându-l pe Schopenhauer:
“To be alone is the fate of all great souls.”

[ناصر سليم]

کتاب اعترافات ژان ژاک روسو
روسو در این کتاب همه جزئیات زندگی اش رو بدون هیچ گونه پرده پوشی عیان می کنه
هنوز شروع به خوندن این کتاب نکردم ولی روسو رو از طریق کتاب ژوزف بالساموا ، الکساندر دوما شناختم
دوما به زیبایی روسو رو تو این داستان وصف کرده بود
در قسمتی از کتاب پسربچه ایی که مدتی نزد روسو زندگی می کنه و اسمش ( تو خاطرم نیست ) قسمت هایی از این کتاب و می خونه می فهمه که خودش هم روحیاتی مثل روسو داره
چرا که روسو تو کتابش درباره رابطه عاشقانه ایی که با دو تا خواهر متمول داشت حرف زده
روسو میگه که من این دختران پولدار رو نه بخاطر ثروتشون بلکه بخاطر ظرافت و زیبایی و تمیزیشون دوستشون دارم
دختر های متمول به خودشون می رسن دست هاشون کشیده و ظریف ولی دخترهای عامه مردم و قشر فقیر هیچ اهمیتی به وضع ظاهریشون نمی دن و این مسئله برای من ناخوشاینده....

[A G · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jean Jacques Rousseau's "Confessions" is a long, muddled rigmarole, his life at its beginnings, the memorials of his youth. He is not silent about his stupidities - 'I am stupid and lacking in presence of mind, and anger instead of sharpening the little I have got deprives me of it altogether' .He follows an inviolable principle to show himself to his friends as he was, neither better nor worse. It is a truthful and detailed story of a tortured creature, battered by every kind of storm, and wearied by many years of travelling and persecution. Since his name is fated to live, he says : I must endeavor to transmit with it the memory of that unfortunate man who bore it as he actually was and not as his unjust enemies unremittingly endeavored to paint him. He presents himself as a just and good man, free from bitterness, hatred, and jealousy, quick to realize when he was in the wrong, even quicker to excuse the injustices of others, seeking happiness always, with virginal timidity and bashfulness, in the gentle emotion of loving, and behaving on all occasions with a sincerity verging upon rashness and with a disinterestedness that was almost past belief. He was a man of extreme sensibilities, he admits : My cruel imagination, which ceaselessly torments itself by foreseeing evils before they arise, interferes with my memory and prevents my recalling them once they are past. In a way I exhaust my misfortunes in advance. The more I suffer in anticipation, the easier I find it to forget. Botany is a passion with him - he would water his well-loved walnut tree with his tears. 'My function is to tell the truth, not to make people believe it'. He revels in the constant enjoyment of the present, his heart still fresh gives itself to everything with the joy of a child, or rather the rapture of an angel, his alarm at the fall of a leaf or the fluttering of a bird, signs of a surfeit of happiness. He confides he can only meditate when he is walking, when he stops, he ceases to think his mind only walks with his legs.In all matters constraint and compulsion are unbearable to him, they would make him dislike even pleasure. When he drops a bunch of cherries into Mlle Galley's bosom, both of them laugh out and he says to himself : Why are not my lips cherries ? He at times wonders if he is so unlike himself that he might be taken for someone else of an entirely opposite character. Once he has written a thing down, he entirely ceases to remember it. I wonder if he entirely ceased to remember his 'Confessions'.

[Dick Heimbold · Rating 4 out of 5]

After several months of slogging along reading Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau, I finished yesterday. Thank heavens. The book I read was from a translation over two hundred years old. The language was tough going with archaic words and weird punctuation and grammar. Rousseau tells his life story and exposes transgressions he made. He came up from a hard scrabble beginning and wandered around France and Switzerland making his way as apprentice engraver until he was fired and then serving various in various households and a time in religious school. A French woman was a long-time patron and eventually mistress. He loved her as a mother and called her mamma. He sometimes made money copying music and as time went by displayed his many talents in the musical arts (including writing an opera) and writing on philosophy and child rearing. Oddly his longest relationship with Theresa Levasseur yielded five children. All of whom he put in a home for abandoned children. Much of this autobiography tells of his suspicions of his friends and enemies about plots against him. He exhibited excessive sensitiveness hypochondria and paranoia. There is no discussion of any of his life works from which the reader could understand their content. Along the way were many friends and patrons who supported him and his works in the salons of Paris mainly. But he managed to fall out with them. He irritated the Church and French government enough for them to hound him out of France and Switzerland. The book ends with him about to leave for England to live with Hume in England. There are moments in the book of wit and good descriptions of his love of nature that redeemed it for me somewhat. A book for the scholar but maybe a bit much for the casual reader.

[Rhianna · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have no clue as to why I was so gripped - but I was. Written like a gossipy chat between friends yet mixed with Romantic grandeur, the Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau are truthful and poignant. Well worth a read

[Colleen Rhea · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting insight into the life and times of his era. I found myself becoming bored with the meticulous detail in which the author describes events in his life, but can be interesting when you bear in mind that, as with every autobiography, the idioscyncrasy of the individual.

[Michael C. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tedious..... I prefer reading his ideas that remain relevant instead of than endless ramblings about rather pedestrian experiences.

[David Etchell]

should be compulsory re reading -- currently re reading the JACT books on learning classical Greek and re reading Ulysses.

[Tayseer · Rating 3 out of 5]

عندى مشكلة من زمان مع مدعى الفضيلة
عاش مع تيريرز ٢٥ سنة بدون زواج ورمى خمس اطفال فى الملجأ ميعرفوش ابوهم او امهم ولسه بيتكلم برضو عن انه مثال للفضيلة الحقة 😏

[Ephrem Arcement · Rating 3 out of 5]

Upon finishing this influential work I get the impression that it is lauded more for its place in the history of autobiography than for its own merits.

[محمد على الهمداني · Rating 3 out of 5]

اعترافات جان جاك رسو كنز ادبي خالد