1592
The great philosopher Michel de Montaigne died yesterday, leaving behind a quite extraordinary heritage, of which the Complete Works of Shakespeare is unquestionably one; but that is not the one that I have chosen today to tell you.
Marie le Jars de Gournay (born October 6 1565; died July 13 1645):
The start of her tale requires a visit to my Feb 28 page, where she embarked on adult life as Montaigne's adoptive daughter. But that was the student, and below is the fully qualified educator, who therefore merits her own listing:
She was a very active “participant in the "Querelle des Femmes” - ”The Womans' Quarrel”, as “Women's Rights Activism” was called back in the 1500s, with writers and thinkers beginning to raise the issue of women's status in society. Her position was the same one that women would continue to insist, equally unsuccessfully, for the next four hundred years; until, guess what, finally, in the latter years of the 20th century, comprehensive education equally for boys and girls was introduced in some countries, and lo and behold, the women were proven right: that, if given an education, women could achieve just as much as men in every walk of intellectual and creative life, and even in the law and commerce and the sciences, and make an equally valuable contribution to the betterment of the entire human race (usually more actually, but let’s not cause upset by stressing that).
She published her first book, “Le Proumenoir de Monsieur de Montaigne” (“The Promenade of Monsieur Montaigne"), in 1594, which you might imagine from the title was an account of his philosophy and a discourse on his writings, but was actually one of the first modern psychological novels, a "best-seller" through its exploration of female sexuality both physical and emotional, and largely fictional.
It was the next book that did what you supposed about the first one: using Montaigne's own notes, and with his full endorsement before his death in 1592, she produced a revised edition of his "Essais" in 1595, by which time she had become "active in the court of Henry IV", which is a male historian’s way of acknowledging her because he has to, while still not yielding to the giving of full credit: she was actually a central figure in the salon of the French queen, "La Reine Margot" as she was known (see March 27).
During those Margot years she published:
* the feminist tract "Egalité des hommes et des femmes" (do you really need me to translate that?) in 1622
* "Grief des dames, Apologie pour celle qui escrit" ("The Grief of Women, an Apology for she who writes") in 1626
* "Peinture de moeurs" ("Character Portrait") also in 1626
all three of which were also included in a volume of her collected works, "L'Ombre de la Demoiselle de Gournay" ("The Shadow of Miss Gournay"), likewise in 1626.
A translation of her "Preface" to Montaigne's Essays can be found here; more on her bio here and here; the latter includes:
Marie le Jars de Gournay (born October 6 1565; died July 13 1645):
The start of her tale requires a visit to my Feb 28 page, where she embarked on adult life as Montaigne's adoptive daughter. But that was the student, and below is the fully qualified educator, who therefore merits her own listing:
She was a very active “participant in the "Querelle des Femmes” - ”The Womans' Quarrel”, as “Women's Rights Activism” was called back in the 1500s, with writers and thinkers beginning to raise the issue of women's status in society. Her position was the same one that women would continue to insist, equally unsuccessfully, for the next four hundred years; until, guess what, finally, in the latter years of the 20th century, comprehensive education equally for boys and girls was introduced in some countries, and lo and behold, the women were proven right: that, if given an education, women could achieve just as much as men in every walk of intellectual and creative life, and even in the law and commerce and the sciences, and make an equally valuable contribution to the betterment of the entire human race (usually more actually, but let’s not cause upset by stressing that).
She published her first book, “Le Proumenoir de Monsieur de Montaigne” (“The Promenade of Monsieur Montaigne"), in 1594, which you might imagine from the title was an account of his philosophy and a discourse on his writings, but was actually one of the first modern psychological novels, a "best-seller" through its exploration of female sexuality both physical and emotional, and largely fictional.
It was the next book that did what you supposed about the first one: using Montaigne's own notes, and with his full endorsement before his death in 1592, she produced a revised edition of his "Essais" in 1595, by which time she had become "active in the court of Henry IV", which is a male historian’s way of acknowledging her because he has to, while still not yielding to the giving of full credit: she was actually a central figure in the salon of the French queen, "La Reine Margot" as she was known (see March 27).
During those Margot years she published:
* the feminist tract "Egalité des hommes et des femmes" (do you really need me to translate that?) in 1622
* "Grief des dames, Apologie pour celle qui escrit" ("The Grief of Women, an Apology for she who writes") in 1626
* "Peinture de moeurs" ("Character Portrait") also in 1626
all three of which were also included in a volume of her collected works, "L'Ombre de la Demoiselle de Gournay" ("The Shadow of Miss Gournay"), likewise in 1626.
A translation of her "Preface" to Montaigne's Essays can be found here; more on her bio here and here; the latter includes:
1592 - Montaigne died but Marie did not learn of his death until
Spring of 1593. Montaigne's widow asked her to prepare a new edition of
the Essays and this came out in 1595. Marie le Jars de
Gournay visited Madame de Montaigne at the family home near Bordeaux for some
fifteen months and then she went to the Netherlands where she was well
received.
Spring of
1593. Interesting date for Shakespeare! But you'll need to go back to Feb 28 for that (the Harold Bloom section), and then see March 15
Amber pages
Franz Bopp, comparative linguistics founder, born today in 1791. I wonder what he would have made of "Be Bopp a Lula she's my baby"? In any language. (Apparently, in the paleolithic south-western dialect of ancient pre-Sumerian Akkadian, the phrase "Bee bopp ha-lulah", phoneticised this way rather than in the Gene Vincent Amerikanized speling, and which may be the source of the song, meant "may the gods grant you a long life and plentiful blonde women").
And did he get to see the comet Hale-Bopp, on its previous transition across the sky (probably not: its orbital period is 2,533 years and it was with us in 1995, which means - o my gosh, it was in the sky in 538 BCE, and two years later, can it be, the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem, the destruction of the First Kingdom of Israel, the start of... the International Zionist Conspiracy, predicted cometically... "Only connect" as E.M. Forster so wisely expressed it.)
Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt, scientist and close friend of Franz Bopp (no, sorry, that was a different Humboldt, Wilhelm von Humboldt, the Prussian ambassador at the Court of Saint James), born today in 1769 (and no, not that Humboldt either, his name was Humbert, this is not the one who wrote "Teenie Bopper Lolita Be My Baby"; he's on April 22)
Ivan Pavlov, the man who taught human dogs how to go woof, born today in 1849 (see September 13)
Apologies for all of the above, but in some parts of the cosmos today is National Levity Day (seriously!). Levity, for the information, is not the opposite of gravity, though in the absurd and pantomime conditions of zero gravity what else can there be but levity? The concept is anyway relative: in certain parts of the cosmos, because of the proximity of black holes, the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics does not apply on Sundays and Bank Holidays, and E=MC3 rather than squared, while a quark is a type of yoghurt, and a quant is a 1960s style of hair-fashion.
And now, on a more serious note...
Margaret (Higgins) Sanger, founder of the US birth control movement (the founder of the Egyptian birth control movement was Pharaoh Rameses, that of Judea King Herod the Great), born today in 1879 (her parents didn't actually intend to have a baby, and... but you can make up the rest of that piece of levity for yourself)
Bachir Gemayel, president-elect of Lebanon, assassinated, today in 1982, the reason for the massacres at Sabra and Shatila two days later (click here)
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