Diotimos Library · Journals, Notebooks & Fragments Collection · Bilingual Edition

Joseph Joubert

The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I

Name: The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I
Author: Joseph Joubert

Complete Notebooks · French with an independent English translation.

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The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume IYEAR 1804 · Entry 3469

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English Page · Branch 3469 of 3781

YEAR 1804 · Entry 3469

Translator notesBook Mode

French

p. 6937

2 mai.

De la nudité. — Que la nature habille tout ou que, du moins, elle n’a rien fait de nud qui ne soit hideux.

Que l’imagination, quand elle a été sage et belle, n’a rien déshabillé que ce qui est hors du monde ou au dessous du monde sans nécessité. L’Antinoüs est un esclave; le gladiateur, etc.

Auguste n’eût jamais souffert qu’on l’eût représenté nud. Antonin l’eût souffert peut-être, mais par un sentiment de stoïcien.

Au dessous de la tête, des épaules et de la poitrine commence l’animal, ou cette partie du corps où l’âme ne doit pas se plaire, auroit dit Platon.

The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I: YEAR 1804

p. 6938

May 2.

On nudity. — That nature clothes everything or that, at least, she has made nothing naked that is not hideous.

That imagination, when it has been wise and beautiful, has undressed nothing but what is outside the world or below the world without necessity. The Antinous is a slave; the gladiator, etc.

Augustus would never have permitted himself to be represented naked. Antoninus might have permitted it, but from a Stoic’s sentiment.

Below the head, the shoulders, and the chest begins the animal, or that part of the body in which the soul should take no pleasure, Plato would have said.

S1.Source editor’s annotationSeparate leaf, dated “May 2, 1804).

S2.Source editor’s annotation“Nota. The worm and man. Sheath in the parts or their shading.”

T14.The opening Que introduces a proposition without supplying its governing clause. Nature’s feminine pronoun is retained; the naked and the hideous remain Joubert’s terms.

T18.The source opens a quotation mark before the date but closes with a parenthesis. That mismatch remains in the English apparatus; the source editor’s explicit year belongs to the leaf’s provenance.

T19.Nota remains the Latin instruction note. Etui is rendered sheath in the bodily comparison. Parts remains as brief as parties, and shading follows ombragement; the fragment does not supply the missing relation between the alternatives.

T279.The source’s nud spelling, diaeresis in Antinoüs, and unhyphenated au dessous are retained. No governing clause is supplied for the opening Que clauses. Clipped right-edge endings are contextually restored.

T15.World can carry a social sense here, beside the slave and gladiator. The final sans nécessité, without necessity, has no unambiguously marked attachment; its position is retained rather than silently making it a settled qualification of one group or one action. The Antinous keeps the source’s article and does not identify a particular statue.

T16.The counterfactual claims about Augustus and Antoninus remain Joubert’s. Antoninus is not expanded to a more specific imperial identity. A Stoic’s sentiment retains the reason attributed to him.

T17.The conditional attribution does not assert a verified quotation from Plato. The animal remains the lower part of the body in Joubert’s sentence, distinct from the soul’s pleasure.

About This Reading Edition

Joubert’s notebooks return to the work of thinking and writing, the demands of friendship, and questions of faith, beauty and conduct. This edition pairs the French with a new English translation, preserving the order of the chosen source and the unfinished character of its fragments. Dates and source references allow readers to follow a thought through time or return to its printed context.

Historical Text and Translation

The French text follows André Beaunier’s 1938 edition of Les Carnets de Joseph Joubert, published by Gallimard from Joubert’s autograph manuscripts. Volume I presents the entries on printed pages 32–475. French and English are aligned paragraph by paragraph, retaining the source order, printed dates and page references so readers can return to the facsimile.

About Diotimos Editions

Diotimos Editions prepared this new English translation directly from the French, preserving Joubert’s distinctions, recurring images, ambiguities and unfinished thoughts. Translator’s notes clarify wording, references and uncertain readings: Essential keeps notes that help explain a passage, while All includes technical detail. Annotations from the 1938 source edition remain distinct from the new translator’s notes.

Rights

The linked facsimile records identify the French source as public domain in the United States. The new English translation and editorial notes are © 2026 Diotimos, with source annotations and new editorial contributions credited separately. This edition pairs the complete French notebooks with an independent English translation, preserving the distinction between Joubert’s text and its accompanying notes.