Montaigne for the 21st century

A few years ago, Antoine Compagnon was asked to host a radio broadcast, every day for an entire summer, on a formidable subject: Michel de Montaigne. From that experience came this engaging and entertaining book, A Summer with Montaigne. An intelligent and thought-provoking treatise in forty chapters that will introduce readers unfamiliar with Montaigne to his unique brilliance and remind those who already know Montaigne’s work of its vitality, force, and enduring timeliness.

Compagnon breathes life into the musings of Montaigne, approaching his subject not as the recluse many imagine him to have been, but rather a multi-faceted individual of complex thought and astonishing analytical prowess. Once the mayor of Bordeaux, Montaigne was a committed spirit of his time, advising his powerful contemporaries and always in touch with the questions and concerns of the moment, of which many remain pressing today. Composed over a period of twenty years, Montaigne’s Essays deal with timeless themes. From the problems posed by religion, war, power and friendship to humankind’s ridiculous weaknesses, Montaigne’s Essays remain a moving commentary on what it means to be a human being in any age.

Antoine Compagnon
Antoine Compagnon is a Professor of French Literature at Collège de France, Paris, and the Blanche W. Knopf Professor of French and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, New York.

• Nov 11 2019
  20 must-read works of innovative nonfiction from 2019
  — Bookriot
• Oct 1 2019
  How to live, pt 1
  — The TLS
• Jun 27 2019
  Advice from Montaigne: You Want to Be Wise? Don’t Read Too Much.
  — Lithub
• May 24 2019
  In Praise of Travel, Particularly on Horseback
  — The Paris Review
• May 9 2019
  A Summer with Montaigne: On the Art of Living Well
  — Library Journal