Title, Structure and Theme of Montaigne's "Des Coches"

Abstract

With single exception of Apologie de Raymond Sebond, title, structure and theme of coches have inspired more discussion than any of Montaigne's essays. Pierre Villey viewed it as three separate essays joined end to end to give illusion of life's incoherence and, along with Rene Jasinski,2 affirmed that title was a caprice, or at best was intended for surprise. Recently, critics have sought some kind of order underlying essay's apparent confusion by seeing it as a model of baroque structure, such as R. A. Sayce who argues in favor of the free associations aroused by a word. 3 Others have tended to limit scope of Des coches by concentrating on Montaigne's criticism of luxury and degeneracy,4 and Rene Etiemble, while holding that title is la part de la prudence, has limited it even more to an implicit criticism of domestic and foreign policy.5 Many of these divergent viewpoints can be reconciled somewhat, and in this reconciliation we can appreciate richness and appropriateness of choice of coaches as theme and title. For as such coaches operate at once as