Joubert, Joseph (1754-1824). Author of pensées, maxims, and some remarkable letters. He was early in contact with Diderot, and later a friend of Chateaubriand, Bonald, Fontanes, Chênedollé, and other major figures of the age. Suffering from poor health, he led a retired life, except for serving under Napoleon in the education ministry.
Much admired for the concise, accurate, at times witty quality of his writing, he refused to compose any work of length, preferring the private ‘carnet’, in which he combines a classical quest for concision with an introspective, analytical bent. He writes in the La Rochefoucauld tradition, but with a more tolerant, even Epicurean view of mankind; his critical judgements on writers are often remarkable for their acuity. A collection of his Pensées was published by Chateaubriand in 1838, followed by the fuller Pensées, maximes, essais et correspondance, published by P. de Raynal in 1842.
[Frank Paul Bowman]
