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Composer: Bach, Johann Sebastian

The Life and Work of Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

Elysium Ensemble

Hossick, Malcolm

Television Director: Hossick, Malcolm

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Narrator: Hossick, Malcolm

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Year of Production: 2015

Playing Time: 00:31:52

Catalogue Number: L7898DVD

UPC: 709629278981

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Montaigne was a French aristocrat born in the middle of the 16th century a while before Shakespeare. He wrote essays about his views on life and in particular about himself. They are wise and amusing and just as pertinent today as they were in this own times. This documentary by Malcolm Hossick follows his unusual and fascinating life. The program begins by giving a sense of Montaigne's views on life suggesting why they are so prescient for today. It follows his unusual education and gives a background of the history of France of which he was for a time actually an intimate part. His brief friendship with a man called La Boetie colours his understanding of mankind and probably plays a part in his deciding to write down all he could think of about himself which forms what we know of as his essays. The program ends with some of the topics which so engaged him and which make him such a charming candidate for our attention in the twenty first century!