LEASSONS OF SOLITUDE

Abstract

One of the most decisive legacy of Modernity was the institution of a new anthropological type, thereafter dominant: the isolated subject. Not a few readers attributed to Rousseau a prominent place in this invention – which seems, at first glance, fully confirmed by the repeated occurrence of the word "alone (seul)" and the theme of loneliness in the overall work of the author. «One could define, in effect, the whole biography of Jean-Jacques as the story of a growing isolation, as the story of solitude", says Bronislaw Baczko. But should the philosophical analysis, especially with regard to our controversial author, bend entirely to biographical dominance argument? After all, what could Rousseau’s solitude teach us in the present?