Please respond to any two of the questions below. You may post your responses as comments on this post, and please take the time to read and respond to your classmates’ comments:
1. Look closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? Please refer to specific textual evidence in formulating your response.
2. For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
3. What was Rousseau’s childhood like? How does he describe it? Include a quotation or detail from the text in your response.
4. How do you make sense of Rousseau’s admission that he found the spankings he received as a child memorably pleasurable? What does he tell us about this experience? Why does he share it? What do we take away from this part of his story?
4. Why do you think Rousseau chooses to include the anecdote about stealing from his employer? What is its importance? How do we explain Rousseau’s behavior in this story?
5. Using your own language, how would you describe the narrator, given his self-presentation in The Confessions?
2.For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
In his early childhood, he wasn’t able to read or write until his father had helped him by reading romantic novels and Greek or Roman novels as well. This allowed him to be in character towards the novel he was reading. Also it allowed for the manifestation of confusion of his emotions because he had no reason towards it. The relationship between thinking and feeling is of how feelings will become fact are synonymous with each other because of how they correlate the thought process between relying on human emotions and thinking about a certain fact because of it.
3. What was Rousseau’s childhood like? How does he describe it? Include a quotation or detail from the text in your response.
Rousseaus’s childhood was weird because he discovered how to feel first rather than to think “…I knew every feeling.I had conceived nothing; I had felt everything” It left with different notions of romantic and weird things about human life. His experience and even his reflection never even manage to hlep solve the issues that he had.
I think Rousseau would say that he was not unusual or weird in having feelings before thoughts. He says that is universal – that babies, for example, feel emotions like fear or joy long before they have the words or thoughts to describe those feelings. Does that make sense?
1. Look closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? Please refer to specific textual evidence in formulating your response.
By looking closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography, the narrator’s purpose is to be completely transparent with the readers, explaining his journey that were imperfect which dealt a lot with his childhood, love affairs, values, relationships, and his personality that lead to his individual experience. I know this because he reveals his most shameful moments which he never revealed to any of his friends but writing confession helped him. He says, “This burden, then, has lain unalleviated on my conscience until this very day; and I can safely say that the desire to be in some measure relieved of it has greatly contributed to the decision I have taken to write my confessions.” It seems that for Rousseau writing his confessions seemed as a way of accepting himself and being truthful which we all should sought after.
Using your own language, how would you describe the narrator, given his self-presentation in The Confessions?
The narrator is obviously not a perfect human, however, he successfully achieved his goal to share his most intimate moments with the reader expressing his regrets, values, morals. I feel that although there were moments on his journey which were questionable, and those that were not the right thing to do. I am still glad that in the end he was honest and revealed everything. Usually, when we imagine a self portrait, it’s most likely a painting, however, in this case he went into details about his life which seemed so raw and honest and for that I find his honesty very respectable.
Sangey, You have identified one of the most important aspects of Rousseau’s autobiography, his claim to be absolutely truthful and to share even those aspects of his personality or life story that might be shameful or difficult to tell. This is a departure from previous autobiographies and becomes the first example of what I would call “modern autobiography.”
1. Look closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? Please refer to specific textual evidence in formulating your response.
The narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions” is he was talking about his childhood, love life, important values and relationships with others that portrayed his experience as a person. I know by he didn’t want to talk about his confessions to anyone and kept it to himself. “His ideas on popular sovereignty (the people, rather than rulers, are the real source of state sovereignty) have since been especially important, as have his arguments calling for recognition of childhood as an important era in a person’s development. ”
2. For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
For Rousseau, the relationship between feeling and thinking is human are people are able to feel and understand emotions before they think. People have an emotional reaction to the environment around them. He means when “I had feelings before I had thoughts : that is the common lot of humanity is the thought and feeling of warm and happiness and then humans decide their way of thinking.
Yes I agree with you, the feeling will comes first, and then you will have thinking how to take your action, the feeling that you have will affect your thinking.
Right, Zijie, in positing that feeling comes before thinking, Rousseau is pushing back against the Enlightenment idea that thinking and rationality more important than emotion.
Simran, He may suggest that he is reluctant to share some of these very intimate stories, but nonetheless, he is the one who chose to include them in his autobiography. This is part of his claim that he will be showing himself as he really is.
Yes, I agree with you. Rousseau believed that feeling and thinking is a human emotion which can be universal which is why humans are able to feel emotions before they think since it lies subconsciously within us.
-What was Rousseau’s childhood like? How does he describe it? Include a quotation or detail from the text in your response.
“Ten months later, I was born, weak and sickly; I cost my mother her life, and my birth was the first of my misfortunes.” Rousseau’s childhood was miserable without a mother. But luckily his family loved him. “I was during my early years…treated always as a much-loved child and never as a spoiled one.”
-How do you make sense of Rousseau’s admission that he found the spankings he received as a child memorably pleasurable? What does he tell us about this experience? Why does he share it? What do we take away from this part of his story?
I think this is a sexual desire that makes him pleasurable. Rousseau confessed his lasciviousness and Sadomasochism, but he had no idea about sex at an early age. He thought this thinking was a sin of lust so he needs to confess, even though”nor does it pose much threat to the virtue of the women who are its object.”
He reaqaly have a terrible life after his mother dead, but the luckly thing happened to him is that the family member really love him.
One of the weird things about Rousseau is that he had a lot of awful things happen during his childhood (his mother’s death and then the loss of both his father and his brother). Nonetheless, he describes himself as having had a wonderful childhood, surrounded by love.
2.For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
-Rousseau makes a sensible limit between feeling something and thinking something. He had emotions and he knew how he expected to feel in explicit conditions anyway didn’t credit any inspiration to the way wherein he was feeling. Theoretically, he was thinking with his heart as opposed to his mind. A tendency is an unadulterated sort of feeling while a consideration is one’s characteristics offered on that identical inclination.
4. Why do you think Rousseau chooses to include the anecdote about stealing from his employer? What is its importance? How do we explain Rousseau’s behavior in this story?-
– The name “Confessions” itself represents as to why he decided to tell his readers everything including all the negative aspects .He could’ve asserted that he planned to compose an honest personal history and afterwards cut out the entirety offensive pieces. Including this part into the tale makes it more genuine, it shows that he is no greater than rest of us.
I don’t understand your response about feeling and thinking. Can you explain more clearly what it is you are trying to say here?
What was Rousseau’s childhood like? How does he describe it? Include a quotation or detail from the text in your response.
I think his childhood was really horrible, because when he was born, his mother really weak, after his mother dead, he has terrible life. In the book page 60 it said “I hve no idea what I did before the age of five or six: I do not knkow how I learned toread; all remember is what I uninterrupted consciousnessof myself.” He has a terrible life without his mother.
For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
I think the feeling comes first, when we have mood, we used that mood we might take action, because the feeling can influence our thinking, from the book that we read from Rousseau, I understand that the feeling comes first and then you will thinking how to take your action.
Yes, as I wrote above, Rousseau is emphasizing the primacy of emotion over reason. This is part of the shift away from the Enlightenment towards Romanticism.
I agree that his childhood was really difficult for him. Especially the death of his mother had a huge impact on him which he carried for the rest of his life. He even says that his birth was the first misfortune.
1. Look closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? Please refer to specific textual evidence in formulating your response.
I believe the narrator decided to write these confessions to reveal how living a life as a man, or human being, on earth can never be devoid of heartache and suffering, by upholding himself as a man with unmatched challenges in life, and who lived life more innocently and purely than any other person, but yet suffering from some of the worst challenges that life could offer. The narrator wanted the audience to understand how hard his life was, and yet how guiltlessly he managed to live it, in comparison to the average person who didn’t go through as much, and yet didn’t live as virtuously as he did. In the first sentence of the text on page 58, the narrator writes, “I am resolved on an undertaking that has no model and will have no imitator.” I believe this description of his life, as an undertaking, emphasizes the author’s burdensome experience in his life, and as he goes on to describe himself as being “more deserving” (58), or “different” (58), this sets the tone for the audience to view Rousseau as a superb, guiltless person. In this respect, Rosseau highlights his adversities in life to underscore his ability to live his life in the exceptionally honest way that he did. This was a way to have the audience understand how highly virtuous Rosseau thought of himself. Additionally, in describing himself as “a man in all the truth of nature,” he provides an understanding into what the life of a man looks like who lived in the burdens of adversity and misfortune, and who encountered the most natural of weaknesses that humanity is subject to, such as youthful lust and heartbreak, and tried to the best of his abilities to do what he knew to be right in light of that.
5. Using your own language, how would you describe the narrator, given his self-presentation in The Confessions?
I would describe the narrator as someone who regrets being alive, and who looks at his life as a tragedy and misfortune. On page 59 the narrator describes his birth as, “the first of my misfortunes,” and even tells his aunt “I forgive you” (60) after she saved him from dying from congenital conditions. In this light, Rosseau portrays himself as a mistake, and can be seen as being very self conscious, as he is able to recount much of his life story, even in such fine detail as to describe his feelings in the moment, such as his sensual feelings towards being punished my Mlle Lambercier. I would also describe the narrator as someone who had good morals instilles in them as a child, and lived life by them to the best of his ability, and even merits virtue to himself by his effort and ability to do what he understood to be right. These moral values largely came from his upbringing.
I am surprised that you describe Rousseau as being “guiltless.” After all, the title of his autobiography is The Confessions, and in each of the anecdotes he shares in the excerpts we read, he shares something shameful about himself. Explain what you had in mind when you described him as being guiltless? He is perhaps trying to “come clean” or unburden himself, but he does seem to feel a lot of remorse.
Although Rosseau includes a lot of his shortcomings and weak moments in life, he still chose to describe himself as “more deserving,” and “at least I am different.” I had these descriptions of himself in mind, I thought that Rosseau was setti g himself apart from others around him in life. I also found it interesting how he wrote that it would be daring for anyone to day that he was “better than that man.” These descriptions of himself lead me to think that even though he wasn’t perfect, he thought of himself as being at least set apart from others in a superior and unique way.
1. Look closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? Please refer to specific textual evidence in formulating your response.
Just like any other autobiography, the purpose of writing this autobiography was for people to know how he lived his life and why he lived it the way he did. It is for us to learn from and just like the like the title of his autobiography, for him to confess. He tells us how he was accused of stealing. He tells us the love story of his parents and how his father circles back to his mother and they were happy but then she passes away during childbirth. He talks about his childhood dramas and how he believes it’s easier for him to act on how he feels rather than thinking rationally. He also tells us about his romantic tale and how it ended. Overall, he talks about all the hardships he had to face in his lifetime. To the world he might have been a hypocrite, but he only allows him to judge himself and not the world as he did what he thought was right.
2. For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
I believe Rousseau is trying to tell the audience that he believes how we feel emotionally eventually effects our thinking process. Even as kids our thoughts aren’t as powerful as our emotions and as children it is easier to express our emotions than conveying our thoughts. Rousseau believes that it is easier to feel and then think rather having our thoughts effect our feelings, it is highly unlikely. And in his confessions, he lets emotions control his actions than thinking rationally, it’s just easier for him that way.
Rousseau’s autobiography was actually very atypical in the 18th century in terms of his willingness to share intimate details about his life and his inclusion of material that is not necessarily flattering to him.
What was Rousseau’s childhood like? How does he describe it? Include a quotation or detail from the text in your response.
For Rousseau growing up wasn’t easy at all. He lost his mother a few days after he was born, and his father left him when he was 10. Rousseau’s older brother would also run away from his family and he would never see him again. He didn’t go to school much either even though he was very intelligent. Rousseau needed to be a troubled kid in order to survive. “Never once while I remained in my father’s house was, I allowed to roam the streets alone with the other children… No doubt I stole fruits, sweets, things to eat”.
For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)?
– Rousseau believes that every individual would have feelings before they can think. Feelings in our youth would develop how we think for the rest of our life. Rousseau proves feelings are before thoughts in ‘Confessions’ and it he seems to be very emotional while writing. I agree with Rousseau, sometimes I feel like I can’t think of what to say but I feel like I know what emotion I’m feeling.
Look closely at the opening lines of Rousseau’s autobiography. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? Please refer to specific textual evidence in formulating your response.
The narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions” is to confess about the life he has lived, because he feels as though he’s had an experience no one else has had. I know this because in the opening lines of the autobiography, Rousseau says, “I have entered upon a performance which is without example, whose accomplishment will have no imitator. I mean to present my fellow-mortals with a man in all the integrity of nature; and this man shall be myself.” This shows that Rousseau is willing to share the good and bad things about himself, even the things that no one else is willing to talk about or admit. He feels that by writing this autobiography, he’s doing something no one else has done before. For Rousseau, what is the relationship between feeling and thinking? What does he mean when he writes, “I had feelings before I had thoughts: that is the common lot of humanity” (60)? For Rousseau, the relationship between feeling and thinking is that feelings occur before thoughts do. I agree with this quote because when something happens, you might feel it physically first such as a shift in energy or a stomach pain before you realize mentally that something is wrong.
1. As we discussed in class, Rousseau’s purpose for writing this text to tell the world that he is different and that is okay. In the opening few paragraph he goes on a rant on whether “nature did well or ill to break the mould in which I was cast” to show us that no matter what kind of person Rousseau is, no one is allowed to judge him with out actually getting to know him. Later on in the text he states “I have told the good and the bad with equal frankness” meaning he is not afraid of telling all the sides there is to him. He wants people to know that everyone is special and unique and its the good and bad that makes a person who they really are.
4. Getting back to the point I made in first answer, I think Rousseau confessed on his crimes because no matter how terrible still was part of what makes him unique. When Rousseau’s employer has finally passed away, Rousseau was left with nothing when all the other servants has gotten a year’s wage. Rousseau couldn’t even keep the suit that he wore all the time so he stole a tiny little bow. And since he did not really try to hide the fact that he was a thief, he quickly lied and said a little girl named Marion had given him. This was significant to him because he still feels “remorse and weighed down” forty years after he has falsely accused a little girl as a thief. He lied and lied through his teeth to protect himself but he feels guilty. So guilty that even after almost a half century later he still gets sleepless nights because of it.
What was Rousseau’s childhood like? How does he describe it? Include a quotation or detail from the text in your response.
I feel as though Rousseau had a bad childhood full of guilt but tries to play it off as otherwise. He makes it seem as if he’s happy but he mentions his mother’s death a lot. He mentions some bad situations that occurred when he was younger but tries to find the positive aspect of it. He stated, “I cost my mother her life, and my birth was the first of my misfortunes.”, which is why I feel that he finds himself guilty. He thinks he is the reason his father lost his soulmate and why he and his sibling do not have a mother.
Using your own language, how would you describe the narrator, given his self-presentation in The Confessions?
I believe him to be a bit of a liar, or perhaps an optimist. The way he sees his life is not actually how it happened but he still always states the positive aspects that perhaps never even occurred. I am a bit unsure about him being a liar because perhaps he sugar-coated his life due to his childhood trauma and bad life. He speaks about how loved he is, how involved his family was. In reality, his life was actually pretty tragic.
You are right to point out Rousseau’s declaration, “I cost my mother her life.” That certainly does seem to suggest that he felt responsible for her death, and we have to assume that that left a heavy psychological burden for him to carry.