Confessions (Jean-Jacques Rousseau)

Confessions (Jean-Jacques Rousseau)
Author(s)	Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Original title	Les Confessions
Country	France
Language	French
Subject(s)	Rousseau, French Revolution
Genre(s)	autobiography
Publication date	1782-1789
ISBN	978-0140440331
OCLC Number	14003975

Confessions is an autobiographical book by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In modern times, it is often published with the title The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau in order to distinguish it from St. Augustine of Hippo's Confessions. Covering the first fifty-three years of Rousseau's life, up to 1765, it was completed in 1769, but not published until 1782, four years after Rousseau's death - even though Rousseau did read excerpts of his manuscript publicly at various salons and other meeting places.

Confessions were two distinct works, each part consisting of six books. Books I to VI were written between 1765 and 1767, and published in 1782; books VII to XII, was written in 1769-1770, and published in 1789.^{[citation needed]} Rousseau alludes to a planned third part, but this was never completed. Though the book is somewhat flawed as an autobiography – particularly, Rousseau's dates are frequently off, and some events are out of order – Rousseau provides an account of the experiences that shaped his influential philosophy. For instance, the parts of his own education he liked best are clearly present in his account of ideal education, Emile: Or, On Education.

Rousseau's work is notable as one of the first major autobiographies. Prior to his writing the Confessions, the two great autobiographies were Augustine's own Confessions and Saint Teresa's Life of Herself. Both of these works, however, focused on the religious experiences of their authors. The Confessions was one of the first autobiographies in which an individual wrote of his own life mainly in terms of his worldly experiences and personal feelings. Rousseau recognized the unique nature of his work; it opens with the famous words:

I have resolved on an enterprise which has no precedent, and which, once complete, will have no imitator. My purpose is to display to my kind a portrait in every way true to nature, and the man I shall portray will be myself.

Some scholars^[who?] believe that his prediction was wide off the mark. Not long after publication many other writers (such as Goethe, Wordsworth and De Quincey) wrote their own similarly-styled autobiographies. However, Leo Damrosch argues that Rousseau meant that it would be impossible to imitate his book, as nobody else would be like Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

The Confessions is also noted for its detailed account of Rousseau's more humiliating and shameful moments. For instance, Rousseau recounts an incident when, while a servant, he covered up his theft of a ribbon by framing a young girl - who was working in the house - for the crime. In addition, Rousseau explains the manner in which he disposes of his five illegitimate children, whom he had with his world-wide known companion, Therese Levasseur.

Online text

• Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau English translation, as published by Project Gutenberg, 2004 [EBook #3913]

See also

• Let them eat cake, a saying deriving from this book
• The New Confessions, a novel by William Boyd (1987)