Montaigne's English journey : reading the" Essays" in Shakespeare's day

__Montaigne's English Journey__ examines the genesis, early readership, and multifaceted impact of John Florio's exuberant translation of Michel de Montaigne's __Essays.__ Published in London in 1603, this book was widely read in seventeenth-century England: Shakespeare borrowed from it as he drafted __King Lear__ and __The Tempest__, and many hundreds of English men and women first encountered Montaigne's tolerant outlook and disarming candour in its densely-printed pages. Literary historians have long been fascinated by the influence of Florio's translation, analysing its contributions to the development of the English essay and tracing its appropriation in the work of Webster, Dryden, and other major writers. William M. Hamlin, by contrast, undertakes an exploration of Florio's Montaigne within the overlapping realms of print and manuscript culture, assessing its importance from the varied perspectives of its earliest English readers. Drawing on letters, diaries, commonplace books, and thousands of marginal annotations inscribed in surviving copies of Florio's volume, Hamlin offers a comprehensive account of the transmission and reception of Montaigne in seventeenth-century England. In particular he focuses on topics that consistently intrigued Montaigne's English readers: sexuality, marriage, conscience, theatricality, scepticism, self-presentation, the nature of wisdom, and the power of custom. All in all, Hamlin's study constitutes a major contribution to investigations of literary readership in pre-Enlightenment Europe. Cover 1 Montaigne’s English Journey: Reading the Essays in Shakespeare’s Day 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Acknowledgements 8 Contents 10 A Note on Quotation, Citation, and Transcription 11 Abbreviations 12 Illustrations 14 Introduction: Edified by the Margin 18 1: Florio’s Th eatrical Montaigne 52 2: Sexuality and Censorship in the Essayes 67 3: On the Tyranny of ‘Custome’: Ideology and Appropriation 84 4: From an English Montaigne to The Dutch Courtesan: Common Customers 112 5: Montaignian Conscience and the Shakespearean God-Surrogate 127 6: Maximizing Montaigne 146 Afterword: English Readership in the Wake of the Essayes 178 APPENDIX A: British Library, Egerton MS 2982, Folios 22 r –29 v (Transcription) 191 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 1ST. / OF THE INCONSTANCY OF OUR ACTIONS. / [M351–8] 191 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 2D. / OF DRUNKENNESS. / [M358–67] 192 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 3D. / OF THE CUSTOME OF YE ISLE OF CEA. / [M368–81] 193 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 4TH . / TO MORROW FOR BUSUNESS. / [M382–4] 194 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 5. / OF CONSCIENCE / [M384–8] 195 LIB. 2. CHAP. 6 . / OF USAGE & PRACTIZE / [M388–99] 195 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 7TH . / OF THE RECOMPENCE OF HONO UR . / [M399–403] 197 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 8TH. / OF THE AFFECTION OF PARENTS TO YR CHILDREN / [M403–24] 198 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 9TH. / OF THE PARTHIANS ARMES. / [M424–7] 201 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 10TH. / OF BOOKES. / [M427–41] 201 LIB. 2D. CHAP. 11TH. / OF CRUELTY. / [M442–57] 204 APPENDIX B: Folger Shakespeare Library, MS V.a.281, Folios 15r –34v (Transcription) 207 MONTAIGNE 207 APPENDIX C: British Library, Sloane MS 2903, Folios 1r –12r (Transcription) 228 MONTAGNES MORAL MAXIMS 228 APPENDIX D: Census of Extant Seventeenth-Century Copies of Florio’s Montaigne 244 FIRST EDITION (LONDON, 1603) : 110 COPIES 244 United Kingdom 244 France 245 Germany 245 United States and Canada 245 Japan 248 Australia and New Zealand 248 United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland 248 France 249 United States and Canada 249 Australia and New Zealand 251 THIRD EDITION (LONDON, 1632): 147 COPIES 251 United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland 251 France 253 Germany 253 Italy 253 Israel 253 United States and Canada 253 Australia and New Zealand 256 Notes 257 INTRODUCTION 257 CHAPTER 1 270 CHAPTER 2 276 CHAPTER 3 282 CHAPTER 4 293 CHAPTER 5 297 CHAPTER 6 304 AFTERWORD 314 Bibliography 318 MANUSCRIPT SOURCES 318 PRINTED WORKS 318 Index 338 'Montaigne's English Journey' provides a vivid account of the way in which English readers made sense of Montaigne's 'Essays' during the seventeenth century and how it influenced their own writing Montaigne's English Journey Provides A Vivid Account Of The Ways In Which English Readers Made Sense Of Montaigne's Essays During The Seventeenth Century And How It Influenced Their Own Writing.