Essays of Michel de Montaigne, Book 2

About this event

"Virtue refuses facility for her companion ... the easy, gentle, and sloping path that guides the footsteps of a good natural disposition is not the path of true virtue. It demands a rough and thorny road." After a brief holiday in the sun, we return to our scholarly towers and pick up, once again, *The Essays* of Montaigne. Although usually bound as one volume, his 107 total essays were published as three books, which we are reading one at a time, with breaks in between. This month, we are only reading the second book. If you didn't attend our June meeting for Book One, don't worry, you really can begin at any point. So pick a translation and get started on Book Two; it's the longest of the three so plan accordingly! As I said at the beginning of this journey, there are four prominent choices among English translators of *The Essays*: 1. [John Florio](https://www.luminarium.org/renascence-editions/montaigne/) (1603) 2. Charles Cotton (1685, but updated by [William Hazlitt](https://gutenberg.org/files/3600/3600-h/3600-h.htm) in 1877) 3. Donald Frame (1957) 4. [Michael Screech](https://ia800909.us.archive.org/10/items/MontaigneEssayscompleteScreech.num/Montaigne%20-%20%27%27Essays%27%27%20%5Bcomplete%2C%20screech.num%5D.pdf) (1991) It is not easy to choose, but Ian Chadwick has made a detailed comparison of these four on [his blog](https://ianchadwick.com/blog/translating-montaigne/), which may influence you one way or another. I will continue with [Frame's translation](https://amzn.to/3SC4zVm). Please join us at 7:00 PM on August 24 at Vino's Los Olas in Fort Lauderdale, as usual.