Author: DAVID CHIKOVANI

Montaigne’s arguments in The Essays were mostly about social circumstances in France during his time. He looked at what was occurring in France with a negative light. He viewed it as a manipulating order that poisoned the uneducated masses. Everything that was occurring was transferred on to the people around and their decisions. To him, it all seemed like a hopeless and endless cycle. “We know by experience that women transmit marks of their fancies to the bodies of the children they carry in their womb.” He wanted to live in a free-thinking society and thought that if people applied their will, the few standout individuals had the opportunity to break free.

Christine de Pizan wrote the City of Ladies to try to change the perception of women during the Middle Ages. During those times man and women both had a very demeaning view about the role of women in society. Her argument was that because of the way the current world functions, men have more opportunities to learn so they have a bigger array of skills and experiences. She wrote the book to argue her points that women can think for themselves and could be equal to men given the opportunity.

Virgil tries to depict warfare as unnecessary and bad. His vision with The Aeneid is to have a time where there are no more wars and the Roman’s lead a successful Empire. Virgil depicts his anti-war views throughout the poem. He uses Aeneas to get his point across by showing that he is tired of war and killing. In book 12, Aeneas feels empathy and forgiveness for Turnus and was even willing to let him live until he saw that he was wearing Pallas’ belt.