The Complete Essays

This is the English edition of all of Montaigne's essays, the work he revised for most of his adult life. The pieces range from a few pages to long treatises. They take up subjects such as death, idleness, education, books, experience, cannibals, the raising of children and the imagination. Montaigne wanders from topic to topic, drawing on classical authors and his own daily life, and he is candid about his habits, his health and his failings. His central subject is himself, studied as an example of ordinary human nature. The book matters as the origin of the personal essay and as a lasting model of humane, sceptical thought.