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Montaigne
on
His
Essays:
Toward
a
Poetics
of the Self- Carl
H.
Klaus
How
often
and
perhaps
how
stupidly
have
I
extended
my
book
to
make it
speak of itself!
BY THE
TIME
he made this exclamation?in
his final
essay,
"Of
Experi
ence"
?Montaigne
had
good
reason to wonder
at how often he had
indulged
in
writing
about his
essays.
Had he
actually
bothered
to make
a
methodical
survey
of his
work,
he would have found that it "turns in
upon
itself"
in his
prefatory
note "To the Reader" and in 27 of his 107
essays.
He would also have found that
inmost of these
essays,
such
self-regard
ing
comments
are not confined
to
just
a sentence
or
two,
but take
up
sev
eral
paragraphs,
often scattered over two
or three
pages
or more. And he
would have found that this
preoccupation
manifests
itself more often and
at
greater
length
as
he
moves
from Book I
to
Book II
to
Book III of his
essays,
so that it
gradually
becomes
a leitmotif of the work
as a whole. But
such
findings probably
would
not have led him
to eliminate
or reduce such
reflexive
passages.
Indeed,
in
keeping
with his
avowedly
contrary
and
unpredictable
behavior,
Montaigne
chose
to
expand
many
of these
passages
in the
process
of
revising
his work. In the final version of his
essays,
for
example,
he turned the
exclamatory
statement that
opens
this
piece
into
a full
paragraph by adding
two
lengthy
sentences which end in
a
justification
of
writing
about his
writing,
"because
my
theme
turns in
upon
itself
Having
made this
excuse for
essaying
his
essays, Montaigne
immedi
ately
wondered whether his readers would
"accept
it" and
thereby allay
his
fear of
having "stupidly"
engaged
in the
very self-regarding
activity
he had
previously
scorned
in others. Far from
exposing
himself to
ridicule,
he
established
a
very alluring precedent,
for
essayists
to this
day
have contin
ued
to write about their
essays,
about other
essayists,
and about the
nature
of the
essay
itself.
Montaigne
not
only
set this self-reflexive
precedent,
but he also defined
most of the
issues that
concern
subsequent essayists
on
the
essay.
So, Montaigne's
self-reflexive
comments are
significant
both
as
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an embodiment of his
thinking
about the
essay
and
as a
harbinger
of subse
quent
ideas of the
essay.
In the
course of
reflecting
on his
essays, Montaigne
covers almost
the
entire
spectrum
of
topics
that
might
be of interest
to an
essayist
or student
of the
essay?from composing
and
revising
his
essays
to
editing
and
pub
lishing
them,
from their
purpose
and
content to their form and
style,
including
matters as varied
as the
titles,
the
length,
the
intelligibility,
and
the truth of his
essays.
In
commenting
on these
topics,
however,
Mon
taigne rarely
stops
to reflect at
length
on
any single aspect
of his
writing.
Indeed,
"being
a sworn
enemy
of
obligation, assiduity, perseverance"
he often shifts
abruptly
from one idea
or
experience
or allusion
to
another,
no matter what
topic
he
happens
to be
discussing.
As he
moves
from one
essay
to the next,
or one book of
essays
to the next,
or one edi
tion of the
essays
to the next,
he often
returns to issues he has discussed
before,
but sometimes he takes
a different slant
on the matter,
so much
so
that
by
his own admission he contradicts himself "now and then"
Though
scattered,
undeveloped,
and sometimes
contradictory,
Mon
taigne's
reflections
on his
writing
do,
I
think,
center
on an interrelated
set
of issues that
can be discerned if
one
surveys
his
comments
collectively
from
beginning
to end. In
particular, they persistently
engage
issues
related
to
Montaigne's unprecedented self-absorption,
his radical
subjec
tivity,
and his bold refusal
to abide
by
the
canons of scholastic
specializa
tion:
I
speak
my
mind
freely
on all
things,
even on those which
per
haps
exceed
my capacity
and which
I
by
no means hold
to be
within
my jurisdiction.
And so the
opinion
I
give
of them
is to
declare the
measure of
my sight,
not the
measure of
things. (298)
Authors communicate with the
people by
some
special
extrin
sicmark: I am the first to do so
by
my
entire
being,
as Michel de
Montaigne,
not as a
grammarian
or a
poet
or a
jurist. (611)
Given
so
keen
an awareness that his
essays
constituted "a new and extra
ordinary
amusement"
"the
only
book in the world of its kind"
it is
hardly surprising
that he
might
have been moved to celebrate
all the distinctive
aspects
and elements
of his
globally subjective enterprise.
or
my
own
glory.
My powers
are
inadequate
for such
a
pur
pose.
I have dedicated it to the
private
convenience of
my
rela
tives and friends,
so that when
they
have lost
me
(as
soon
they
must), they
may
recover here
some features of
my
habits and
temperament,
and
by
this
means
keep
the
knowledge they
have
had of me more
complete
and alive.
If
I
had written
to seek the world's
favor,
I
should have
bedecked
myself
better,
and should
present myself
in
a studied
posture.
Iwant to be
seen here
in
my simple,
natural,
ordinary
fashion,
without
straining
or
artifice;
for it is
myself
that I
por
tray. My
defects will be read
to the
life,
and also
my
natural
form,
as far
as
respect
for the
public
has allowed. Had I been
placed
among
those nations which are said to live still in the
sweet freedom of nature's first
laws,
I assure
you
I
should
very
gladly
have
portrayed myself
here entire and
wholly
naked.
Thus, reader,
I
am
myself
the matter of
my
book; you
would
be unreasonable
to
spend
your
leisure
on so frivolous and vain
a
subject.
In this
prefatory
note,
Montaigne clearly
identifies himself as the
subject
of his
essays,
but his
manner is
so
provocative,
so
paradoxical,
so
playful
even,
as to
suggest right
off that the
note is in
part
an elaborate
literary
gesture designed
to overcome some of the uneasiness that he
must have felt
as a result of
having
made himself "the matter" of his book.
Lacking
any
notable
precedents
for
so
solipsistic
an
enterprise, Montaigne
must have
wondered how
to defend himself
against
the obvious
charge
of
being
arro
gantly preoccupied
with himself. As if
to forestall such
a
charge,
he
repeat
edly
disclaims
any
interest in his "own
glory"
or in "the world's favor."
Indeed,
he
carries this
self-deprecatory posture
so far
as to conclude with
the declaration that his avowed
subject
is "frivolous and vain." In
a simi
larly paradoxical
vein,
he
reiteratively
disavows
any
interest in the reader
whom he addresses
so
solicitously.
In
a
variety
of
ways,
then,
this
prefa
tory
note is
so
hyperbolically
at
war with itself
as to seem like
a rhetorical
tour
deforce,
intended
to disarm
his
potential
critics
by amusing
them with
its
witty
contradictions.
In its
playful
way,
however,
this brief
note also
constitutes a
pointed
manifesto,
a
literary
declaration of
independence
from the fundamental
assumptions
and
practices
of classical rhetoric and medieval scholasticism.
The
revolutionary
nature of
Montaigne's enterprise
comes
through
most
directly,
of course,
in his bold assertion that
"I am
myself
the
matter of
my
book,"
an assertion which
immediately
makes clear that his book is
not a
conventional
treatise in
philosophy, theology,
or
any
other field of knowl
edge.
No less
revolutionary
is his insistent
repudiation
of interest in his
nominal reader,
for such disclaimers
tacitly challenge
the fundamental
premises
of
any
rhetorical
enterprise.
In one
sense,
of
course,
Montaigne's
dismissal of the reader ?his arhetorical
posture
?constitutes the
most
powerful
way
of
authenticating
his
concern with himself. But in another
sense,
his
repeated
attentions to the reader
suggest
a desire
on his
part
not
to
repudiate
the reader
altogether
so much
as to
repudiate
a conventional
ized
relationship
of writer and reader. This
seemingly paradoxical
treat
ment of the reader
ultimately speaks
for
a desire to reconstitute the rela
tionship
along
new
lines,
according
to which
presumably
the reader will
make
none of the usual
expectations
in
reading Montaigne,
but will
follow him
no matter how "frivolous and
vain,"
or
wandering
and
unpre
dictable,
he
may
seem to be. In this
respect,
the note
seems to be
making
a
claim for
something
very
much like
a rhetorical carte blanche.
Montaigne
also
challenges
traditional
conventions here
by declaring
his
commitment to
a
"simple,
natural, ordinary
fashion." In
keeping
with
this stance,
he
openly rejects
"a studied
posture,"
much
as he
rejects
any
kind of
"straining
or artifice." This rebellious
preference
for
being
natural
rather than
artificial,
"naked" rather than
"bedecked,"
is
justified by
Mon
taigne
on
the
grounds
of its connection
to his
overriding
concern with
himself?"it
is
myself
that I
portray."
Given this intention
to
present
him
self
as
authentically
as
possible,
to
"keep
the
knowledge"
that his relatives
and friends have had of him "more
complete
and alive,"
Montaigne
com
mits himself
to a
way
of
writing
that he
ultimately
associates with
an
Edenic vision of
purity
and
simplicity,
reflected in the "sweet freedom of
nature's first laws." The
essay,
in
effect,
is
presented
here
as
being
a kind of
writing
that hearkens back
to an Unf?llen?
prerhetorical?
world.
From
the
very
start, then, Montaigne overtly
allies the
essay
with
an anti
worldly impulse,
and
by
extension with
an anti-conventional
style.
And
as
if
to confirm the rebelliousness of his
essays,
he
concludes this address to
the reader
by openly acknowledging
the
anti-pragmatical
nature of their
focus
upon
"so frivolous and
vain a
subject."
painting,
arises out of an
attempt
to
give
visible
form and
shape
to
something
that is
essentially
invisible and
"shapeless,"
to
"portray"
something
that is
essentially intangible, especially
given
the
intangibility,
the
"airy
medium,"
of
language
itself.
But
Montaigne
represents
the
problem
in
even more
complex
terms,
for
he conceives of the self
as
being
most
authentically
reflected
not
just
in
thoughts
per
se,
but in the flow of
thought,
in the
process
of meditation.
To
portray
himself,
in other
words,
requires
not
an
exposition
of his
thoughts,
but
a
depiction,
as it were,
of his
mind in the
process
of think
ing.
For
Montaigne,
then,
the ultimate
challenge
is to
convey
the
experi
ence
of
thinking
itself:
It is
a
thorny undertaking,
and
more so than it seems,
to follow
a movement so
wandering
as that of our
minds,
to
penetrate
the
opaque depths
of its innermost
folds,
to
pick
out and
immobilize the innumerable
flutterings
that
agitate
it.
As he defines the
problem
in this
passage,
it is caused
in
part by
the
very
digressive
habit of the
mind,
which he
depicts
as
being
so
dynamic
in its
"wandering,"
so
given
to
"movement,"
to "innumerable
flutterings,"
that
"to follow"
it
is, indeed,
"a
thorny undertaking."
In
fact,
as his final
metaphor
suggests,
the thorniness
is caused
by attempting
not
only
to
track the flow of one's
thought,
but also
to record the flow and thus
"immobilize"
it at the
very
same time that
one is immersed
in the
process
of
thinking.
Thus the
undertaking
is, indeed,
"more
[thorny]
than
it
seems,"
because
it entails
a
perceptual juggling
act that
is
logically impos
sible without
a radical division of mental consciousness
into
subject
and
object,
into the observer and the
thing
observed.
Montaigne's
ultimate
goal,
then,
is
to
depict
the self
as it is known
only by
the self alone.
Given his commitment
to this
dizzying
mental task,
Montaigne
evi
dently
went
to
extraordinary
lengths
to devise
a
way
of
generating
his
essays
that would
leave his mind free to follow its
own
inclinations,
as
well
as enable
him to follow and record
its
wandering
movements as
closely
and
as
accurately
as
possible.
He describes
or reflects
on his
compos
ing process
in
numerous
passages,
and
collectively they
create the
impres
sion that his
writing
arises out of a
process
so free of
any
mental
preplann
ing, outlining, structuring, rearranging,
or
editing
as to be
completely
uninhibited:
I let
my thoughts
run
on,
weak and
lowly
as
they
are,
as I have
produced
them,
without
plastering
and
sewing
up
the flaws
I
take the first
subject
that chance offers.
They
are all
equally
good
to me. And
I never
plan
to
develop
them
completely.
(219)
I have
no other marshal but fortune
to
arrange my
bits. As
my
fancies
present
themselves,
I
pile
them
up;
now
they
come
pressing
in a
crowd,
now
dragging single
file.
Here,
as
elsewhere,
Montaigne
claims
to write "without
a
plan
and with
out a
promise" (219),
"without definitions,
without divisions,
without
conclusions"
"without
any system" (824).
His
composing process,
as he describes
it in these and other such
passages,
is
purportedly
so
sponta
neous,
so free from
any
kind of artificial
manipulation
or intervention
on
his
part,
that he
appears
to be
something
of a
passive
agent,
whose
thoughts
take whatever direction
they
will,
and thus whose
essays
are
shaped by
"chance" and "fortune" rather than
by personal
intention
or
intervention
?by
"nature" rather than
"by
art."
Indeed,
he
implicitly
depicts
himself in these
passages
not as an
author, carefully planning
and
shaping
his
material,
but
as an
amanuensis,
slavishly recording
and
piling
things
up
as
they
come to
mind,
"without
plastering
and
sewing
up
the
flaws."
Montaigne
is
presumably
so
eager
to let his mind follow its
own
bent and
to include all of its
ramblings
that he claims
to
"pile
up only
the
headings
of
subjects,"
rather than
obliging
himself
to
develop
them into
"numberless
essays" (185).
For similar reasons,
he refuses
to be distracted
by
the bother
of
correcting
the
punctuation
or
spelling
of his
essays
In
fact,
he declares himself
at one
point
to be
opposed
to
correction of
any kind,
because he does
not wish
to
misrepresent
himself
by excluding
"the
imperfections
that
are
ordinary
and
constant in me."
It seems
quite fitting,
then,
that in the last of his comments
on
writing,
he refers
to his work
as "this fricassee that
I am
scribbling" (826).
Just
as he
avows an uninhibited
composing
process,
so
Montaigne
also
proclaims
his
prose
to be free
from
any
mechanical
or methodical con
straints?"My style
and
my
mind alike
go roaming" (761).
In
keeping
So it is that he
self-consciously espoused
an unstructured mode of
writing
attuned to his sense of the mind's
wandering
movement and thus
of his
frequently shifting perception
of
things. By pitting
himself
so
clearly
and
so
persistently against
Aristotle,
Cicero,
and the medieval
scholastics,
Montaigne
established the
now conventional
posture
of the
essayist
as an
independent,
often
skeptical
mind,
exploring
ideas and
experience
outside
the confines of received
or
prevailing
intellectual
structures. In
doing
so,
he established the
essay
as an
open
form of
writing,
at odds with
systema
tized bodies of
knowledge
and
systematized
modes of
transmitting
knowledge:
Learning
treats of
things
too
subtly,
in a mode
too artificial
and different from the
common and natural
one.
If
Iwere of
the
trade,
Iwould naturalize art as much
as
they artify
nature.
(666)
Yet even in the act of
staking
out
so iconoclastic and libertarian
a role
for himself and for the
essay, Montaigne
was
evidently quite
conscious,
as
implied
by
his
prefatory
note and
by
the
numerous comments
bearing
wit
ness to his
elaborately
contrived
attempts
at "free
writing,"
that his own
composing
process
and his own
prose
were not so free and natural
as
they
might
seem. As
early
as the first edition,
for
example,
in
speaking
of his
"harsh"
style (483),
he
acknowledges
that
"I am
quite
conscious that
sometimes I let
myself
go
too
far,
and that in the effort to avoid art and
affectation,
I fall back into them in another direction"
(484). By
the
sec
ond edition,
he
openly
admits that his
way
of
writing
is
deliberately
calcu
lated
to create the illusion of
being
a free and natural
activity:
I
go
out of
my way,
but rather
by
license than carelessness.
My
ideas follow
one
another,
but sometimes it is from a
distance,
and
look at each other,
but with
a
sidelong glance.
I
have
run
my eyes
over a certain
dialogue
of Plato,
a fantastic
motley
in
two
parts,
the
beginning part
about
love,
all the
rest about
rhetoric. The ancients do
not fear these
changes,
and with
wonderful
grace they
let themselves thus be tossed in the
wind,
or seem to. The titles of
my chapters
do
not
always
embrace
their matter;
often
they only
denote it
by
some
sign,
like those
other
titles,
The Maid
of
Andros,
The
Eunuch,
or those other
names, Sulla, Cicero,
Torquatus.
I love the
poetic gait, by leaps
and
gambols.
It is
an
art,
as Plato
says, light, flighty,
daemonic.
There
are works of Plutarch's inwhich he
forgets
his
theme,
in
which
the treatment of his
subject
is found
only incidentally,
quite
smothered
in
foreign
matter. See his movements in "The
Daemon of
Socrates." Lord what
beauty
there is in these
lusty
sallies and this variation,
and
more so the more casual and acci
dental
they
seem.
It is the inattentive reader who loses
my subject,
not I. Some
word about
it
will
always
be found
off in the
corner, which
will not fail
to
be
sufficient,
though
it
takes little
room.
I seek
out
change indiscriminately
and
tumultuously.
My style
and
my
mind alike
go
roaming. (761)
From the
beginning
to the end of this
passage, Montaigne
seeks
to dis
pel
any
notion that his
essays
are the
product
of
undisciplined thinking
and
writing.
Indeed,
Montaigne
is so concerned here to
distinguish
his inten
tional
digressiveness
from authorial carelessness
or casualness
that he
devotes this
lengthy passage
to
defining, illustrating,
and
explaining
a
revolutionary
concept
of textual coherence which
accounts for the
unity
of
his work. He defines this
concept
in the second sentence,
by
means of
an
arresting personification
which endows his "ideas" with the
capacity
to
"follow
one
another,
but
from
a
distance,
and
look at each
other,
but
with
a
sidelong glance."
As this
personification
suggests, Montaigne
con
ceives of
his ideas
as
being
so
deeply
allied
to each other and attuned
to
each other that their
inner cohesiveness has the
power
to overcome the
surface
digressiveness
of his
prose. Having
defined his
special theory
of
coherence, Montaigne
then
proceeds
to cite the classical
precedents
for it
in Plato's Phaedrus
and Plutarch's "The Daemon of
Socrates,"
carefully
drawing
out the
parallels
between these works
and his own
by noting
that
"the ancients
let themselves
be tossed
in the
wind,
or seem to."
This
repeated
concern with
a
calculatedly wrought
impression
of
digres
siveness reaches
its climax
at the end
of the first
paragraph
in
Montaigne's
exclamatory
transformation of the
concept
into an esthetic
principle?
"Lord what
beauty
there is in these
lusty
sallies and this variation,
and
more so the
more casual and accidental
they
seem."
In this bold exclama
tical,
and
suggestive
form,
his
essays require
instead
a reader
especially
attuned
to
following
him
on
all
of his mental
jaunts,
a reader who like
him
"love[s]
the
poetic gait, by leaps
and
gambols."
Thus,
in this
passage
as in
others, Montaigne emphatically
allies his
essays
with texts that
use lan
guage imaginatively
and thus
require literary
rather than literal
interpreta
tion.
The need for such
interpretation
is
especially compelling
in the
case of
Montaigne's
numerous statements about the
subjectivity
of his work.
Most of these
widely
scattered comments contain echoes of his
prefatory
assertion that "I am
myself
the matter of
my
book,"
so one can
easily
be
lulled
into
taking
them
at face value,
as reiterations and reaffirmations of
his
self-regarding activity.
But from
one such
passage
to the next,
Mon
taigne
tends
to
express
somewhat different attitudes
or ideas about the
reflexivity
of his work and to invoke
correspondingly
different
metaphors
pertaining
to its
reflexivity,
as if he
were
trying
out different
ways
of
con
ceiving, defining,
and
expressing
the
relationship
between his
essays
and
himself.
Accordingly,
it seems
appropriate
to examine these
passages
in
detail,
not
only
because
they
bear
directly
upon
the
subjective
orientation
that
Montaigne
claimed
to be the hallmark of his
essays,
but also because
in
doing
so
they tacitly explore
an
aspect
of the
essay
that has
perennially
fascinated
essayists
and students of the
essay?namely,
the
persona
of the
essayist
and
its
relationship
to the
essayist's
self.
In some
passages, Montaigne depicts
his
essays
as
being
so
intimately
connected
to himself and
authentically expressive
of himself
as to be indis
tinguishable
from
himself, indeed,
identicalwith himself:
It is
not
my
deeds that I write
down;
it is
myself,
it is
my
essence.
In other cases,
one
may
commend the work
apart
from the
workman;
not
so
here;
he who touches the
one touches the
other.
Everyone recognizes
me in
my
book and
my
book in
me.
By equating
his book and himself
in
such
hyperbolic
terms,
Montaigne
confers
upon
each the
qualities
of the other.
To read his
essays, then,
is
to
partake
of his essential
being
?that is to
say,
his
thoughts,
not his deeds
as
surely
as if
one were
literally
in his
presence,
or,
for that matter,
in the
presence
of his mind
itself;
and
to be in his
presence
is
presumably
to
par
take of his book
as
surely
as if
one were
literally reading
his
essays
?"he
who touches the
one touches the other."
But
in other statements,
clearly
at odds with these
striking equations,
Montaigne portrays
his
writing
as
being
in
some sense
distinctly
different
from himself. To
some
extent,
the difference results from what
appears
to
be an unavoidable obedience to the rules and
etiquette
of
public
discourse:
There is
no
description
equal
in
difficulty,
or
certainly
in useful
ness to the
description
of oneself. Even
so one must
spruce up,
even so one must
present
oneself
in an
orderly arrangement,
if
one would
go
out in
public.
Now,
I
am
constantly adorning
myself,
for I
am
constantly describing myself. (273)
Here,
as in his
prefatory
note
(2), Montaigne acknowledges
the
necessity
to
"spruce up
in
public,"
so it
might
seem at first
glance
that he is
simply referring
to the
act of
censoring
or
editing
his
thoughts
to fit the
rules of
public
taste. But
by
this
point
it should be clear from his
preoccu
pation
with the natural flow of his
thought
that he is
ultimately
concerned
in this
passage
with the
manipulation
or distortion of the flow that inevit
ably
arises from the
exigency
of
having
to
put
one's
thoughts
in a
publicly
intelligible
form
?"in an
orderly
arrangement,
if
one would
go
out in
public."
So,
he
implies,
the
movement from inner
speech
to written
text
results
willy-nilly
in the
creation of a
persona
that
is in some
respects
dis
similar from his
own sense of himself. Thus
in the final
sentence of the
pas
sage
he
metaphorically portrays
the
discrepancy
between his
writing
and
his
thinking,
between his book and
himself,
as
being
an inexorable
state of
affairs
?"I am
constantly adorning myself,
for I
am
constantly describing
myself."
This inexorable
difference,
as
Montaigne
makes
clear,
also arises from
the intimate
relationship
between himself and his
work,
a
relationship
that
paradoxically
divides them even
as it ties them
to one
another,
much as
a
parent
and child
inescapably
grow apart
from each
other
despite
their
manifold
ties to each
other:
In the first
two sentences of this
passage, Montaigne depicts
himself
as
having
had
to
compose
his
thoughts
so often
in order
to make them
pub
licly acceptable
and
intelligible
that he has
gradually developed
a
persona
that differs in
some
respects
from his own inner sense of himself. Pre
sumably,
he has done
nothing
more than smooth
out the
rough
and
poten
tially
disagreeable edges
of his
thought,
but the
process
has led him
to
believe that he has
"painted [his]
inward selfwith colors clearer than
[his]
original
ones."
So,
it would
seem from these
first two sentences that
Mon
taigne
thinks of his work
as
being
somehow different from himself. But in
the third sentence,
he
manages
to transform the difference into
a source of
identity, by
means of
an
arresting
turn of
thought,
in which he conceives
of
a
reciprocal relationship
between his
essays
and himself?"I have
no
more made
my
book
than
my
book has made
me."
By recognizing
that
the
act of
writing
is
doubly
formative?that the self
is both the
shaper
and
the
thing shaped?Montaigne
is able
not
only
to resolve the
contradiction,
but
also to make the
extraordinary
claim that his work
is "consubstantial
with its author." In this
striking
conceit,
as in no other
moment in his
essays, Montaigne lays
claim
to a
unique,
indeed
mystical, identity
between his book and himself.
This
boldly religious metaphor
has
understandably
attracted consider
able
scholarly
attention,
so much
so that
some commentators have taken it
to be
a dominant emblem for
Montaigne's conception
of the
relationship
between his
essays
and himself.9 But the closest that he
ever comes else
where in the essays
to
affirming
or
reinforcing
the
consubstantiality
of his
book and himself is in the three
very
brief
passages
that I have
already
cited
In other cases,
by
contrast,
he refers
to the book
quite
simply
as a
"history,"
"memoir,"
or "record" of his "reveries," "ideas,"
or
"thoughts" (504,
and in
doing
so
tacitly
makes
a clear
distinction between his
essays
and himself.
In still other cases,
he refers
to
his
writing
as a
"confession,"
ameans of
"revealing"
himself,
or of
making
himself known
and
in
doing
so
tacitly
con
ceives of it neither
as a static
record,
nor as a consubstantial
being,
but
as a
devout
activity.
And in
yet
another set of
passages,
more numerous and
extensive than the others,
he refers
to his work
as
a
"painting"
or
"self
portrait" (2,
This
metaphor,
as
distinguished
from the others,
implies
that his
work
constitutes an artistic
likeness,
rather than
a
replication,
record,
or
revelation,
of his self.
In
trying
to construe this mix of
metaphors,
I have been
strongly
tempted
to focus
on the
image
of the book as
self-portrait,
to
give
this
metaphor
the heaviest
interpretative weight,
not
only
because
it
appears
more
frequently
and
pervasively
than
any
of the others,
but also because
Montaigne's
fascination with the
art of
self-portraiture
can be traced back
at least
to
some twelve
years
before he
began
work
on the
essays,
when
he "saw
King
Francis II
presented,
in remembrance
of
Rene,
King
of
Sicily,
with
a
portrait
that
this
king
hadmade of himself"
The
idea of the book
as
self-portrait
is
especially appealing,
because it invites
a
richly suggestive
line of
comparison
with the obsessive
self-portraits
of
D?rer,
particularly
with the
epistemological
and technical
problems
of
simultaneously observing
and
portraying
oneself that D?rer had
already
confronted in the visual medium of
painting.
But
Montaigne
does
not
seem to have been
aware of D?rer's
self-portraits,
nor does he
ever invoke
the
metaphor
of
painting
to
explore analogous problems
between visual
and verbal
self-portraiture.
In
fact,
as can be
seen from the
parenthetical
page
references cited
above,
the
metaphor
of
self-portraiture
often
appears
side
by
side with
one or more of the others. And
over the
course of these
passages, Montaigne
does
not
give
any
clear indication
as to which
meta
phor
takes
precedence.
In the
passage analyzed
above
the
metaphor
of consubstantiation
clearly supersedes
that of
self-portraiture.
But in
other cases,
Montaigne
moves so
quickly
from
one
metaphor
to the other
that he
seems to be
using
them
almost
interchangeably
or
synonymously:
Others form man;
I tell of
him,
and
portray
a
very particular
one, very ill-formed,
whom I should make
very
different from
what he is if I had
to fashion him
over
again.
But now it is
done.
Now the lines of
my painting
do not
go astray, though they
change
and
vary.
The world
is but
a
perennial
movement. All
things
in it
are in constant motion ?the
earth,
the rocks of the
Caucasus,
the
pyramids
of
Egypt?both
with
the common
mo
tion and with
their own.
Stability
itself
is
nothing
but
amore
languid
motion.
I cannot
keep
my subject
still.
It
goes along
befuddled and
metaphor
or
single point
of view
in
reflecting
on his
essays
and himself. At
some
moments,
evidently,
he
regarded
his work
as
being
so faithful
an
expression
of his
thoughts,
of his mind in
action,
as to be
virtually
iden
tical,
indeed "consubstantial,"
with himself,
or at least to be
an authentic
revelation of himself.
At other times,
just
as
obviously,
he
regarded
his
book
as
being
more
nearly
an artistic
representation,
or at least
a recon
struction,
of his
thinking
and thus referred to it
as a
portrayal
of
himself,
or as a
history
or record of himself.
So,
he often wavered
among
the differ
ent
metaphors
and their
differing implications.
Yet
on some
occasions,
he
apparently
saw so little difference
among
the
metaphors
as to use them
interchangeably
or to resolve their contradictions
by
a
leap
of wit
or faith.
In other
words,
Montaigne
did not maintain
a "firm"
or stable
conception
of his work and
its
relationship
to
himself,
except,
of course,
for his
unremitting
desire
to
bring
it "to
fidelity" (611).
In
relentlessly
pursuing
that
goal,
and in
relentlessly reflecting
upon
his
pursuit
of
it,
Montaigne
endowed the
essay
with
an intense consciousness of
consciousness that has
been, perhaps,
its
most
enduring
and definitive
quality.
To conclude this
piece simply
by noting Montaigne's
unstable view of the
relationship
between his work and himself
must seem like
a small return
for
so
large
an investment of time and effort
as was involved in
tracking
down, sorting,
and
analyzing
his
numerous and
widely
scattered
com
ments
on his
writing.
And in
a
sense,
the return is
quite
small,
particularly
when measured
against
the
more
expansive,
definitive,
and conclusive
view that readers
ordinarily
crave of
any
writer who absorbs them so
much
as I have been
by
Montaigne.
Indeed, my
instincts in this
respect
have led
me to make several
attempts
at
pulling together
the various
strands of his
thinking
on the various
topics
he
discusses,
so as to
produce
something
here at the end like
an
explicit
definition
or summation of his
poetics.
Yet each
attempt
has led
me to
experience
anew how
persistently
Montaigne's
reflections
on his
writing
resist codification. Oh
yes,
he does
unequivocally
locate
himself and his work
in
opposition
to the rhetorical
and scholastic
heritage
of classical and medieval
discourse,
and
in
doing
so
he
clearly
establishes the
essay
as an
antigenre,
as a kind of
writing
whose
distinguishing
characteristic
is its freedom from the
strictures of methodi
cal form and
thought.
But in the
process
of
enunciating
and
elaborating
this coherent and
overarching position,
he
repeatedly
seems to be
poised
between
two or more assertions
or attitudes
or stances that
cannot be
tidily
resolved. At
some moments he claims
to record the natural flow of
his
thoughts exactly
as
they
come to
mind,
but at other moments he
acknowledges
the record of his
thinking
to be an
elaborately
contrived
performance, though
contrived
in order
to reflect
something
like his
actual
thoughts
and habits of mind.
At some moments he
perceives
his
work
to be of
a
piece
with
himself,
but
at other moments he
regards
it
as
being
more
nearly
like
a revelation
or a
self-portrayal
or
merely
a chronicle
of himself.
At some moments he disavows
any
interest in the reader,
at
other
moments he
clearly
seeks
to
realign
the reader toward the
special
mode of
reading
and
interpretation
he considers
necessary
to
an under
standing
of his work. So, any
formulation of his
poetics
would have
to
reflect his
wavering
view of
virtually everything
from the
inception
to the
reception
of his
essays.
To
some
extent,
of course,
these unstable views
may
be attributed to
changes
in outlook and
practice
that took
place quite naturally
over the
twenty years
that
Montaigne
was
working
on his
essays.
In his first book
of
essays,
for
example,
most of which
are
relatively
brief,
he
espouses
a
preference
for short
pieces by claiming
that "I
cut
myself
off
so often for
lack
of
breath;
I
have neither
composition
nor
development
that
is worth
anything."
Whereas
in his third
book of
essays,
most of which
are much
longer
than those
in the first
two
books,
he has altered his view of the
mat
ter: "Because such
frequent
breaks into
chapters
as I used
at the
beginning
seemed to me to
disrupt
and dissolve attention
making
it disdain
to settle
and collect for
so
little,
I have
begun making
them
longer, requiring
fixed
purpose
and
assigned
leisure."
Such unstable
views
may
also be attributed
to the
unprecedented
nature
of
Montaigne's literary
venture.
Lacking
any
clearcut antecedents
or
models for the
essay,
other than such
remotely
connected works
as the
Platonic
dialogues
and the Senecan
epistles,
he must often have felt
uncer
tain about
exactly
how
to fulfill his
professed
commitment to a natural
way
of
writing.
Indeed,
given
his decision
to
be
guided by
the freedom of
nature rather than the rules of art,
Montaigne
could
not avoid
a substantial
amount of
uncertainty
both in
composing
his
essays
and in
reflecting
on
them. In
writing
his
essays,
he was,
after
all, venturing
into terra
incognita,
