Montaigne

At the height of the civil war, there is a knock on the door at the Château de Montaigne. A man has been attacked, and begs to be let in. Little by little his companions arrive. Montaigne smells a rat: a devious ambush! But he lets everybody in with generous hospitality. The lord of the castle’s naivety softens the heart of the ringleader, who gives the signal to withdraw. War forces people to adopt unusual survival strategies. With this episode, Montaigne recommends ‘naturalness’ in one’s behaviour at the same time as clever dissimulation. This is also the strategy he uses in his essays: whether he is writing about friendship, marriage, good conversations, bringing up children, or his illnesses, eccentricities and obsessions, he always comes across as completely guileless, and yet he is playing with his readers. Until now, people have drawn conclusions about Montaigne’s life from his writings, which are beguilingly authentic. Volker Reinhardt takes the opposite approach, and uses Montaigne’s life as a starting point to help us better understand his essays: as a philosophy for survival in times of violence which still speaks to us today.

*‘I want people to see me in all my simplicity, natural and ordinary, without affectation or artificiality.’ - Michel de Montaigne

*A new portrait of Montaigne: the mayor, diplomat and politician in the context of his time

*A new understanding of the ‘Essays’: a philosophy for survival in times of violence, which is still relevant today

*Compellingly written by a leading expert on the 16^th century