Diotimos Library · Journals, Notebooks & Fragments Collection · Bilingual Edition
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I
Complete Notebooks · French with an independent English translation.
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Facing Pages · Branch 167 of 3781
YEAR 1789. · Entry 167
French
p. 333Comte de Lauragais, vous vivez sans chevaux et sans valets. Bientôt vous vivrez sans maîtresses! Hélas le temps en ôtant toutes ses forces au corps ôte au cœur toutes ses faiblesses... Vous aviez fait un bel ouvrage dans les jardins de Manicamp, l’hiver en déchira les pages.
Vos arbres ont... Ils borderont le noir rivage. Un si grand malheur vous a laissé froid, et tranquille, l’ouvrage de la constitution vous occupe seul et... Tel le poète oublioit et livroit à la dent de l’envie ses éclogues et les géorgiques pour composer son Enéide et fonder le peuple romain. Etc.
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I: YEAR 1789.
p. 334Comte de Lauragais, you live without horses and without servants. Soon you will live without mistresses! Alas, time, in taking all its strength from the body, takes all its weaknesses from the heart... You had made a beautiful work in the gardens of Manicamp; winter tore its pages.
Your trees have... They will line the black shore. So great a misfortune has left you cold and calm; the work of the constitution alone occupies you and... Thus the poet forgot and abandoned to the tooth of envy his eclogues and georgics, to compose his Aeneid and found the Roman people. Etc.
Socrates
Reading The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I · YEAR 1789. · Entry 167
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.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.