The reveries of the solitary walker
"Jean-Jacques Rousseau was one of the first great writers to express in all its force the agony of isolation and alienation. In Reveries of the Solitary Walker, ten meditations written in the two years before his death in 1778 and published anonymously in 1792, Rousseau records his state of mind as he walked around Paris, looking at plants and day-dreaming. He goes back over much of his earlier life in an attempt to justify his actions and beliefs, to understand his contradictory impulses and to define the conditions of true happiness. Combining abstract thought, lively anecdote and passages of great evocative power, the Reveries provide an excellent introduction to the complex and fascinating world of one of France's most influential writers..." -- Back cover.