What do you think?
Rate this book
Jean Jacques Rousseau. La transparence et l'obstacle
"Le domaine propre de la vie intérieure ne se délimite que par l'échec de toute relation satisfaisante avec la réalité externe. Rousseau désire la communication et la transparence des coeurs ; mais il est frustré dans son attente et, choisissant la voie contraire, il accepte - et suscite - l'obstacle, qui lui permet de se replier dans la résignation passive et dans la certitude de son innocence." Jean Starobinski.
457 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
6 people are currently reading
232 people want to read
About the author
Jean Starobinski
136 books42 followersJean 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.
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.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 12, 2011
Offers a more negative interpretation of Rousseau than you'll find in Cassirer or Hulliung.
August 27, 2024
I was very disappointed by this rather unenlightening book on Jean Jacques Rousseau. Starobinski, a psychiatrist, lets himself be distracted by Rousseau's psy·cho·log·i·cal pathologies. In the final essay, Starobinski acknowledges that since it is impossible to assess Rousseau, it is inappropriate to comment on his mental health issues yet this is exactly what Starobinski does throughout the book.
Starobinski argues that Rousseau believed that society creates obstacles that prevent man from acting according his natural instinct which is to be virtuous. Social man becomes obsessed with appearance to the neglect of his true inner essence. Given that man is obliged to live in society, the only solution is to be transparent. I think Starobinski is misrepresenting Rousseau who while lamenting the negative impact of society on man's moral conduct still admits that he does not believe that the golden age of nature when man was virtuous ever truly existed.
Another weakness of the book is that Starobinski while focusing on Rousseau and his complex personal pyschology largely ignores Rousseau's position relative to the other enlightenment philosophers.
Starobinski argues that Rousseau believed that society creates obstacles that prevent man from acting according his natural instinct which is to be virtuous. Social man becomes obsessed with appearance to the neglect of his true inner essence. Given that man is obliged to live in society, the only solution is to be transparent. I think Starobinski is misrepresenting Rousseau who while lamenting the negative impact of society on man's moral conduct still admits that he does not believe that the golden age of nature when man was virtuous ever truly existed.
Another weakness of the book is that Starobinski while focusing on Rousseau and his complex personal pyschology largely ignores Rousseau's position relative to the other enlightenment philosophers.
June 10, 2012
Starobinski has read all of Rousseau and carefully. This book is neither biography nor literary criticism. As I read it it is a phenomenological attempt to get at the principles of Rousseau's character and understand both how they influenced his writings and his life. As the title suggests Starobinski finds these principles in Rousseau's quest for transparency and aversion to obstruction. It is well worth reading this book to find out just what that means. What is striking to me about Rousseau is that he was able to raise his personal idiosyncrasies to the level of a philosophy and that that philosophy has resonated with so many people ever since. Starobinski manages to convey just this complex vision by refusing to reduce Rousseau to any causal schema and carefully reading what Rousseau. If I have a criticism of this book it is that Starobinski repeats or rephrases himself over and over again. I don't think this is accidental, or a matter of stylistic weakness, but an effort to capture the fullness of Rousseau's meaning. Nonetheless, given my way of reading I found the soup sometimes too thick.
February 25, 2019
An interesting quote: "Each generation discovers anew Rousseau, finding in him an exemplar or either what it wishes to be or what it passionately rejects."
Another: "I cost my mother her life, and my birth was the first of my misfourtunes."
It was through literature that Jean Jacques first became self-aware. "I do not know what I did until I was five or six," he wrote, "I do not know how I learned to read. I only remember my first books and their effect on me; it is from my earliest reading that I date the unbroken consciousness of my own existence."
Interestingly, in 1728 Jean Jacques left his cruel master and became a "tramp," moving from one job to another. Later Rousseau wrote, "I was never a real child. I always felt and thought as a man. It was only when I grew up that I settled into my proper age." These wanderings, however, helped instill in the young man a compassion for the poor and oppressed.
In 1736 Rousseau became seriously ill, It was during this time that he began systematically to study literature and science. He read Voltaire's *Philosophical Letters* which "gave him a thirst for knowledge which never extinguished." (pg. 23)
An enjoyable book if one loves history.
Another: "I cost my mother her life, and my birth was the first of my misfourtunes."
It was through literature that Jean Jacques first became self-aware. "I do not know what I did until I was five or six," he wrote, "I do not know how I learned to read. I only remember my first books and their effect on me; it is from my earliest reading that I date the unbroken consciousness of my own existence."
Interestingly, in 1728 Jean Jacques left his cruel master and became a "tramp," moving from one job to another. Later Rousseau wrote, "I was never a real child. I always felt and thought as a man. It was only when I grew up that I settled into my proper age." These wanderings, however, helped instill in the young man a compassion for the poor and oppressed.
In 1736 Rousseau became seriously ill, It was during this time that he began systematically to study literature and science. He read Voltaire's *Philosophical Letters* which "gave him a thirst for knowledge which never extinguished." (pg. 23)
An enjoyable book if one loves history.
January 5, 2022
pas trop de fun mais c lecole 🤨🤨🤨
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews