![]() ![]() In 1761 Rousseau’s novel, “Julie, ou La Nouvelle Héloïse,” electrified Europe, purportedly causing readers to swoon, suffer seizures and sigh interminably. While in Paris, Rousseau entered an essay contest on the subject, “Have the arts and sciences contributed to the moral improvement of mankind?” Rousseau’s answer (“No”) so impressed King Louis XV that the king offered Rousseau a pension. There he entered into an affair with a seamstress named Thérèse Levasseur, who bore him at least two and, possibly, five children, all of whom were placed in orphanages. The ever-thoughtful Madame de Warens secured a plum job for Rousseau with the French Ambassador in Vienna, but Rousseau was bored and quit, lighting out for Paris. Since she was also intimate with her steward, Rousseau’s first sexual experience was as part of a ménage à trois. ![]() At that point, his care was given over to an aristocratic woman, Françoise-Louise de Warens, who oversaw his education and also took Rousseau as her lover. Rousseau’s mother died giving birth to him and he was mostly raised until his teen years by an uncle. ![]() Even by the loose standards of his era, Jean-Jacques Rousseau lived a bizarre life. ![]()
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