Jean Jacques Rousseaus Social Contract - Book Report/Review Example

Rousseau’s mother died only a few days later on July 7 and his only sibling, an older brother, ran away from home when Rousseau was still a child. Rousseau was therefore brought up mainly by his father, a clockmaker, with whom at an early age he read ancient Greek and Roman literature such as the Lives of Plutarch. His father got into a quarrel with a French captain, and at the risk of imprisonment, left Geneva for the rest of his life. Rousseau stayed behind and was cared for by an uncle who sent him along with his cousin to study in the village of Bosey.

In 1725 Rousseau was apprenticed to an engraver and began to learn the trade. Although he did not detest the work, he thought his master to be violent and tyrannical. He, therefore, left Geneva in 1728 and fled to Annecy. Here he met Louise de Warens who was instrumental in his conversion to Catholicism which forced him to forfeit his Genevan citizenship (in 1754 he would make a return to Geneva and publicly convert back to Calvinism). Rousseau’s relationship to Mme. de Warens lasted for several years and eventually became romantic.

During this time he earned money through secretarial, teaching and musical jobs.” (Delaney J. J. “Jean Jacques Rousseau” Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. October 21, 2005)How did it come about that a man born poor, losing his mother at birth and soon deserted by his father, afflicted with a painful and humiliating disease, left to wander for twelve years among alien cities and conflicting faiths, repudiated by society and civilization, repudiating Voltaire, Diderot, and the Encyclopedia, and the Age of Reason, driven from place to place as a dangerous rebel, suspected of crime and insanity, and seeing, in his last months, the apotheosis of his enemy—how did it come about that this man, after his death, triumphed over Voltaire, revived religion, transformed education, elevated the morals of France, inspired the Romantic movement and the French Revolution.