The Complete Essays of Montaigne

Each morning I wake up at 6am, eat a bowl of oatmeal, then walk downstairs to spend some time on the elliptical machine before heading out to my sedentary desk job. I purchased a mini stereo system that plays MP3 CDs and I listen to audiobook essays while I exercise.So far I've listened to Frame's Translation of Montaigne's Essays, Dryden Translation of Plutarch's Lives (http://www.amazon.com/Plutarchs-Lives-Vol-Part-Plutarch/dp/0786110406/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353780747&sr=1-5&keywords=Plutarchs+Lives%2C+Vol.+1), as well as various Emerson Essays (http://www.amazon.com/Essays-Ralph-Waldo-Emerson-Second/dp/1455154180/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353780876&sr=1-3&keywords=ralph+waldo+emerson)What a truly great way to start the day. Even if the rest of the day is an utter, unbearable, drawn-out disaster it is still a day worth living because I spent an hour improving my mind and body. Montaigne, Plutarch, and Emerson are stirringly wise. In the morning their words rouse my mind and bestow pragmatic advice. Their writings are rich yet sprightly.Next I plan to listen to Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius.I realize this review is more about me and my morning routine than Montaigne's greatness or Donald Frame's inimitable translation, but enough reviews have been written on those topics; this book is essential for living. I just want to share a fulfilling routine I have established and recommend purchasing duplicates--the book and the MP3 CDs--so that you can listen to the essays at times when it may be inconvenient to read them.

This is one of my favorite books, but, as it is a collection of essays the Audiobook should be split along those lines. Instead it is an enormous audiofile with no way to access individual essays. For example. I'd love to listen to "on experience" tonight, but am not able to as I have no real way of finding it in the xx+ hours of audio.

Chistopher Lane does a fantastic performance of the essays. The reading is clear and crisp. Even with my hearing impairment I have no problems understanding. The four mp3-cds run over 49 hours. I downloaded them to my Mac and in turn to my iPhone. Montaigne and Lane make a wonderful companion for my daily walks as we march together to our final goal. Montaigne and I will have done about 200 miles when we arrive at Horace's prayer for old age: "Grant me but health,.../And to enjoy the wealth I've won, /And honored age, with mind entire /And not unsolaced by the lyre."

Montaigne wrote his essays from a universal perspective. Each, therefore, communicates along a multiplicity of channels. First, of course, is the putative subject at hand: "Of the Education of Children," for example. If you want to know what Montaigne thought of this subject, read the essay. But read the essay, also, to locate your own views on ANY subject. Montaigne will open your mind to you because the freedom of his thought arouses a mirrored fluidity in your own. It transcends the subject at hand. Openness is its own, unlimited reward, bringing clarity wherever your thoughts happen to land. That is Montaigne's gift to us--the experience of his thought.

Much wisdom in his writings. No debate about greatest playwright...Shakespeare. And no debate about greatest essayist...Montaigne!!!

Having accomplished the rather daunting task of reading all the essays of Montaigne I thought that, given its classic status, I would simply share my personal reflections for what their worth.Montaigne knew all the ancients and came to the reasonable conclusion that they couldn’t agree on anything. Not understanding the ramifications of the birth of science taking place in his day, Montaigne settled into a form of skepticism.What makes him somewhat unique is, despairing of understanding the wider world, Montaigne turned inward and simply observed himself. By reflecting so closely upon himself he discovered universal elements of the human condition. Thus, his work continues to interest and inspire even in modernity. While Descartes, Leibniz and early modern thinkers make for rather archaic reading, Montaigne continues to be worth encountering because of this decision to reflect on the human predicament rather than on more metaphysical questions.I cannot say I enjoyed all of it but I am glad to have read it. Montaigne is a classic that still merits reading. Highly recommended.

Montaigne was the mayor of Bordeaux, an educated man who watched his father die in agony from gallstones and expected to die the same way. He was a man who loved life--wine, women and philosophy, but after the death of his father he retired and began these meditations on life, seeking solace in the great record of human experience found in the classics. Montaigne wrote during the bloody religious wars of the Counter-Reformation--one of his essays describes his near death at the hands of Protestant marauders. The combination of the highly civilised culture of the France of his day and the seething and pitiless violence that was also a fact of life was also a subject that drove him back to the classics. These profound meditations, eternally relevant, will assist anyone who continues to reflect on the wonder and the pity of human existence.

If it comes down to owning this book or the bible, then you should own this book.

No one should not know Montaigne. One of the redemptive Frenchmen.

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