Montaigne's Revisions

Abstract

Montaigne composed his essays through an elaborate and extensive process of additions, a revision process that was ongoing throughout the quarter century he was working on them. His painstaking practice of addition helps complicate the "self" Montaigne often tries to convey—that of a casual, digressive, "open" writer. The revisions also supply a metacommentary on his writing project (including his tendency to make additions). In these self-reflective additions, he openly grapples with the dominance of writing mentors, particularly Seneca and Plutarch, and he works out a theory of audience for his work.