Naive individuals can prove ineffective because of their inability to grasp other people’s motivation. They fail to take notice of discrepancies, overlook danger signals, and do nothing to cover their downside. When they finally wake up, it may prove too late to rectify the errors.
Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) embodies the opposite of naivety because his observations revolve around human nature. In every situation, he always wanted to grasp the motivation of the persons involved.
Before becoming a writer, Montaigne had practised law for a decade in Bordeaux. He had many times found himself in the middle of family and business conflicts, and had witnessed the best and worst of human nature.
Naivety leads to severe errors in philosophy and practicality because it prevents people from looking at the full picture. The errors come from giving exaggerated importance to details, or from failing to see the purpose behind those details.
Since Montaigne had anchored his essays solidly in reality, I find it ironic when critics perform a naive, unrealistic literary analysis of his works. Those critics focus on accessory details, while missing Montaigne’s central philosophical purpose.
Literature students are told that Montaigne’s style is defined by his use of the first person, historical and personal anecdotes, rhetorical questions, humour and irony, but they are rarely told about the underlying purpose.
Those students devote large efforts to studying a bunch of trees, one by one, but fail to see the forest. Their naivety makes them blind to the interaction between the various elements and to their common purpose.
I call their approach mistaken because it prevents them from reaching useful conclusions. We could ask ourselves a hundred times why Montaigne wrote in the first person, used historical anecdotes and rhetorical questions, but the answers will remain elusive as long as we fail to look at the full picture.
Montaigne’s essay “On the three kinds of relationships”
Let me illustrate those errors with an example, namely, the essay titled “On the three kinds of relationships” which passes review to the main characteristics of marriage, friendship and parenthood.
Naive critics will focus on superficial elements such as the use by Montaigne of historical and personal anecdotes. Indeed, the essay contains anecdotes for each type of relationship, but we cannot draw any conclusions from the anecdotes alone.
Montaigne draws from the Bible the example of King David and Jonathan (eleventh century BC) as a relationship of mutual trust and shared intellectual interests. Each of the two men held a very different social position, but their friendship developed all the same.
On a personal level, Montaigne refers to his friendship with Etienne de La Boetie (1530-1563), a man who had shared the interests of Montaigne in philosophy, history and literature.
In the section devoted to marriage, Montaigne recalls a few examples of harmonious couples in history, such as Alexander the Great (356-323 BC) and his wife Roxanne. Their enduring love, theorises Montaigne, rested on their deep compatibility.
When it comes to parental relationships, Montaigne recalls the Roman Emperor Augustus (63 BC-14 AD) and his mother, Atia. She died shortly after Augustus twentieth birthday, after having nurtured his social and political talents, preparing him for a successful career.
Montaigne’s use of personal and historical anecdotes makes his essays entertaining, but taken in isolation, the anecdotes do not lead us to any conclusion. We cannot identify Montaigne’s style in this way because all essay writers recount anecdotes.
I oppose a piecemeal approach because it narrows our field of view unnecessarily. In order to define a style (philosophical, literary, or otherwise), we need to ask why. What’s the point of those anecdotes, humour, irony, and rhetorical questions?
Montaigne is neither creating any new categories nor giving any new details. He is recounting anecdotes that he had drawn from Plutarch (46-120 AD) or from the Bible. His literary style is hard to define if we take a naive, short-sighted approach.
A sharper picture of Montaigne’s literary analysis
Fortunately, the picture becomes sharp when we take a step back. Montaigne’s literary style becomes easy to define when we ask ourselves why.
Montaigne had no interest in filling pages rambling about a solid friendship in ancient Israel, a happy marriage in Ancient Greece and effective parenthood in Ancient Rome.
His goal was hundred per cent practical; he wanted to figure out the common element in all successful relationships. What’s the common characteristic in all enduring friendships, effective parenthood, and loving marriages?
Montaigne employs the anecdotes to steer the discussion in the right direction, that is, towards the conclusion he wants to prove. In this case, that all successful human relationships rely on deep compatibility.
He defines friendship as “a deep spiritual bond that reflects our own personality.” In the same manner, he defines a loving marriage as “the blending of two individual souls.” Finally, he characterises successful parenthood as a “careful equilibrium of love and wisdom.”
Montaigne’s panoply of literary artifices becomes perfectly comprehensible once we grasp their intent. Let’s not forget the lesson that, when analysing any situation, we should first of all inquire about the parties’ motivations.
If you are interested in putting rational ideas into practice in all sort of situations, I recommend you my book “Asymmetry: The shortcut to success when success seems impossible.”