The Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The Confessions

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

1782 (completed by 1769)

French Autobiography

The Well-Educated Mind Biographies

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Though Confessions falls under the Enlightenment literary time period, Rousseau wrote as an early Romantic.  He lived by the seat of his emotions and full of contradictions, which maybe explains why he was not very stable.  He was a contemplative wanderer (drawn to serenity in nature and the country) and an emotional wreck.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau may be known as the philosopher whose ideas inspired the French Revolution, but Confessions was more personal and introspective than philosophical.  He did not include great details about his social, political, or educational concepts in this autobiographical work, particularly those ideas from The Social Contract and Émile, and that left me even more curious. 

In the first half of Confessions he seemed a typical energetic, young boy, curious about his world. His father taught him to love reading, and it was from books that he developed a romantic view of the world and life.  But very early on he believed his life was burdened, beginning with the loss of his mother, immediately after his birth.   He ran away from a difficult apprenticeship as a teenager, and found himself in the care of a much older woman (who was like a mother to him, and whom he worshiped obsessively); then they became intimate lovers, and it was simply a very odd relationship, indeed.

To add to his complications, Rousseau suffered from poor health and moved from job to job.  He learned to become a music teacher, which was totally hysterical because he knew nothing about music.  But he eventually taught himself and genuinely contributed to the field.  He even wrote operas. 

By the second half of his story, after his (mother-figure) lover rejected him for being absent too long, he moved in together with a young woman and her family.  At some point, the woman, whom he was certain was his soul mate, became pregnant, and he convinced her to give the baby to the State orphanage.  

According to Rousseau, they did this four more times.  Later he claimed it was out of fear of poorly raising his children under his current situation: he was not well-off; he would not be a good father; and he was prone to wander. In addition, he disliked his young lover's family, and did not want them to influence his children.  (That is usually why couples move out and have their own home, but I digress.) He did eventually marry this poor girl many years later.  

In continuing the topic of lovers, he became obsessed with another young woman, who was married and had a second lover herself.  He was so sure that this was love, and it was this woman who became the subject of his highly praised romantic novel Julie or The New Heloise.  But this intimate relationship proved to be ruinous, which was bound to happen.

Speaking of disastrous, Rousseau, while a solitary man, also adored and prized his friendships very much.  Many of them were people he shared his ideas with, people he admired, and people he trusted.  And because he later lived in the public eye - given his position in administration, the popularity of his operas, and his published literary works - he was often criticized and challenged by others, including Voltaire who opposed his ideas. His philosophical notions caused such uproar that book burnings and threats to his liberty and his life haunted him everywhere.  Even his home country, Geneva, rejected him.

After Rousseau became an expert in the fields of education and child rearing, thanks to Émile, it was no wonder that he was criticized, given the abandonment of his children. If he was such a champion of mothers nursing their babies, as opposed to hiring wet nurses, why did he never gave the mother of his own children the opportunity to nurse her babies?  Like I said, he was contradictory.  But then again, hearts can change.

Everyone had a reason to be against him.  Religious orders were angry with him because he rejected original sin and saw all religions equal.  But he also blamed arts and sciences for the corruption of men, which he believed were born good but affected by their external influences.

Personally, Confessions was an amusing read, and I enjoyed the translation, but it was also a temperamental roller coaster ride for me.  I started off feeling allured by his sweet, innocent charms, but then I was put off by some of his odd behaviors that bordered perversion.  (In my day we called what he did "flashing.") But I forgave him for that.  

His peculiar relationship with an older woman left me perplexed.  (And I thought Madonna invented the Boy Toy in the 1980s.)  By the time he shared the story about five children he had with his young lover, which they gave up to the State, I changed my mind about him drastically and only saw his selfishness.  

His unstable and infatuated love interest with a married woman was truly problematic, especially because it was coupled with his lustful fantasies.  Though he was not entirely explicit, I think it was too much personal information for me.  

Finally, he was a bit arrogant about himself and his high expectations of how others should treat him. But by the time it was apparent that friends, acquaintances, and the world had turned against him, I had pity for him.  Compounded by his poor health, every day was a bad day for Rousseau, even if he did bring it on himself.  If I could, I would have given him a hug because he really needed one.

So what is to be done now?  Regretfully, I remember nothing about Rousseau's ideology from my college philosophy class.  I am curious to understand his philosophical ideas, and why he was opposed, now that I have been acquainted with the man.  At some point, I'd like to read Émile, The Social Contract, and maybe even Julie.  I want to know what materialized from the mind of this complex man after reading the inside story of his heart. Then I can go back to his Confessions and say, "Ah, that is why he thought as he did."