The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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A genius laid bare - Rated
The Confessions is acclaimed as the first recognisable autobiography. Early on I was impressed by his honesty and the depth of his analysis of his early sexual life : Freud would owe him credit. An essentially middle-class struggle to find a trade, respect, and income, the ultimate failure of which - mainly through his inability to learn and adapt -- led him to make some independent and of course original thoughts. With his autobiography, you can see his other works came about. As a proud outsider who came to be as prickly and proud as a porcupine, why wouldn't he have been thought about the degrading affect of money and status (Origins of Inequality, and The Social Contract) . As an eternal trier and at times embarrassing failure, why wouldn't he eventually contribute something musical (Le Devin du Village). That's the beauty of this detailed work: it's the man laid out bare, and it's his genius explained. He was awkward, uncomfortable, and this more than his pride stood him outside of society. His life with the simple Therese; he needed her company, he valued her steady presence over the polygamous Mme Warens he so once worshipped. He gave his children away because (we suspect from the book) he didn't want the child in the hands of Theresa's in-laws. His life is awe-inspiringly tragic due to the proud man at once wanting acceptance (love) from his peers, and then almost simultaneously pulling away from society as a way of protecting himself from their opinions.

Rousseau's painfully honest account of his life. - Rated
This book is another by Rousseau that shows his diversity as a thinker and imagination as writer, as with 'Confessions' he practically invented the autobiographic genre.

Unlike most subsequent autobiographers, Rousseau's principle aim is to lay bare his failings and vices without attempting to apologise to the reader for his often surprising revelations; as he often repeats, God will be the judge.

Ultimately, this is a melancholy tale about a man desperately seeking a peaceful, solitary life but unable to escape the demands and injustices of society. The final passages reveal Rousseau to be a tragic character, hounded by critics and apparently unwanted by the public, but stubbornly clinging to his priciples.