As the volume’s editor makes abundantly clear in his introduction, travel is instrumental to Michel de Montaigne’s thought and to the Essays. Above all, it enables one to engage in situ with other nations’ beliefs and customs, and so, to arrive at a more enlightened understanding of one’s own and to a greater flexibility of intellect and character—all invaluable qualities, especially in times of dogmatic and political implacability, as were the French civil wars. The Travel Journal is arguably all the more valuable to appreciating the Essays because it brings a unique experiential dimension to Montaigne’s writing about human society. However, the text poses considerable challenges to analysis. Montaigne never published his travel journal, and it was not until the 1770s that the manuscript was discovered, published for the first time, and subsequently lost. Analysis is further complicated by the fact that it is written in part by a secretary and in part by Montaigne, who expresses himself for a significant portion of it in a (relatively) foreign language, Italian. Inspired by such challenges, this volume invites the reader to consider anew the status of the Travel Journal within Montaigne’s oeuvre, specifically as a record of critical practice (pratique critique) rather than as a literary text. Far from questioning the Travel Journal’s centrality, this collection means to show that studying Montaigne while he is far from home can “broaden reader reception of the Essays” (9).

The volume’s most salient quality in this regard is the rich intellectual, political, and cultural context it provides for appreciating the places and people that capture Montaigne’s attention. Having eschewed the constraints of literary analysis, contributors are free to explore the significance of ostensibly peripheral details as well as material fundamental to Montaigne’s works. Some aspects of Montaigne’s journal explored here, and often from different perspectives, include his place in the nascent genres of literary and didactic travel narrative; how he navigates the challenges of traveling through early modern Europe, including Montaigne’s appropriation of the Italian language; his commerce with the intellectuals, thermal baths, and books that punctuate his itineraries; his experience as a humanist abroad; and, in one instance, Montaigne’s small but decisive contribution to the recent reconstitution of a lost marvel of hydraulic engineering. Moreover, as announced, some of the present studies originate in journeys inspired by Montaigne’s and the contributor’s imagination (voyages imaginés), as well as in journeys Montaigne likely made (voyages possibles), and those he documented substantially (voyages avérés). The former are especially compelling when events pertinent to Montaigne’s life serve to clarify a briefly recorded yet arresting detail and its relevance to the larger scope of his travels (e.g., Élisabeth Schneikert on Montaigne’s unfulfilled desire to see Cracow). Considering the Travel Journal from yet another perspective, it is fitting in a volume where this text figures as a record of critical practice that several contributors study Montaigne in various postures of essaying himself against the practices and opinions he encounters abroad. Whether Montaigne is testing his mind or his character, or using his body as a laboratory to process physically as well as intellectually local cuisine and established medical wisdom, this approach often conveys the underlying consonance between Montaigne, the Essays, and his journal, as imperfect as it may be (e.g., Amy Graves-Monroe on the parallels between Montaigne’s authorial, apodemic, and intestinal digestion).

While Montaigne and his works may appear marginalized in the contributions that address more narrowly defined fields of inquiry, ultimately this volume offers an impressive breadth of insight into the diverse milieus that shaped Montaigne’s experience abroad, and so facilitates access to the now-remote realities to which he responds and which he records in his journal. In terms of presentation, the quantitative and technical studies contain helpful illustrations and, as a whole, the volume is complemented with rich footnotes, bibliographic references, an index nominem, and summaries of individual contributions. Although Montaigne à l’étranger speaks especially to readers familiar with the Essays, it may well inspire readers more and less familiar with Montaigne’s works to continue exploring them, in a different light.