Voyage Around My Room: Selected Works of Xavier de Maistre

by Xavier de Maistre, Stephen Sartarelli (Translator), Richard Howard (Introduction)

In 1790, while serving in the Piedmontese army, the French aristocrat Xavier de Maistre (1763-1852) was sentenced to house arrest for forty-two days, for dueling. The result was a discursive, mischievous memoir, his classic Voyage Around My Room. De Maistre's literary output began with his Voyage (1794) and ended with its sequel, Nocturnal Expedition Around My Room (1825), with a few shorter pieces in between. In addition to the Voyage and Expedition, this Selected Works includes the compelling dialogue "The Leper of the City of Aosta" (1811) and a "Preface" by Xavier's better-known older brother, the reactionary Joseph de Maistre.

Genres: Nonfiction, France, Classics, French Literature, Philosophy, Memoir, Biography Memoir

228 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1825

About the author

Xavier de Maistre of Savoy (at the time, a region of the Kingdom of Sardinia), lived largely as a military man, but is known as a French writer. The younger brother of noted philosopher and counter-revolutionary Joseph de Maistre, Xavier was born to an aristocratic family at Chambéry in October 1763. He served when young in the Kingdom of Sardinia army, and wrote his fantasy, Voyage autour de ma chambre (Journey Around My Room, published 1794) when he was under arrest in Turin as the consequence of a duel.

Xavier shared the politics and the loyalty of his brother, and after a French revolutionary army annexed Savoy to France in 1792, he left the service, and eventually took a commission in the Russian army. He served under Alexander Suvorov in his victorious Austro-Russian campaign and accompanied the marshal to Russia in 1796. By then, Suvorov's patron Catherine II of Russia had died, and the new monarch Paul I dismissed the victorious general (partly on account of the massacre of 20,000 Poles after he conquered Warsaw). Xavier de Maistre shared the disgrace of his general, and supported himself for some time in St. Petersburg by miniature painting, particularly landscapes.

In 1803, Joseph de Maistre was appointed the Sardinia's ambassador to the court of Alexander I, Tsar of Russia. On his brother's arrival in St. Petersburg, Xavier de Maistre was introduced to the Minister of the Navy, and was appointed to several posts including director of the Library, and of the Museum of Admiralty. He also joined active service, and was wounded in the Caucasus, attaining the rank of major-general. In 1812 he married the Russian lady, related to the Tsars, Mrs. Zagriatsky, and established himself in his adopted country, even after the overthrow of Napoleon, and the consequent restoration of the Piedmontese dynasty.

Reviews

[Bill Bruns · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not more than a moment ago I experienced paroxysms of fear: I could not recall the whereabouts of this book.

It's a pet theory of mine that no matter how much you read, you will only be able to truly know a handful of works in one lifetime. Voyage is such a work in my life. For anyone with anchorite tendencies this is a magnum opus and will touch you to the quick. The narrative is anything but to the point - but that's the point! Without digression life is flavorless and, "Why should [the soul] refuse any of the delights scattered along the difficult path of life?" Fans of Rabelais, Cervantes, Jonathan Swift, Laurence Sterne, and Thomas de Quincy will wonder how this enchanting book remains largely overlooked today. Like these elastic authors, de Maistre lacks no breadth of reason, passion, or humor even when discoursing on seemingly trivial matters. De Maistre is a minister of minutiae, and this is his manifesto.

Necessary reading for all serious sedentary voyagers.

[Tosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Voyage Around My Room" is the perfect book to read when in bed with a cold. In another life, I would like to list my favorite books to read in bed while sick. This would be in the top ten for sure. The author, Xavier de Maistre, was busted for dueling and sentenced to house arrest for 42 days. What came out of that self-imprisonment is this book. It borders on a Georges Perec or Alain Robbe-Grillet type of fiction, but it was written in 1790. Xavier comments on the paintings and furniture in his room. In essence, time has stopped. It can even be a critique of at then modern living. The sensibility behind this book is timeless. It's work from the past but seems very present.

The author reflects on his life through his landscape, which is the room. I would recommend writers to read this book, in the same sense one can read Raymond Queneau's "Exercises in Writing" or Joe Brainard's "I Remember." It reminds me that one is never truly shut off from the world when they have pen and paper.

[Raphael Lysander · Rating 5 out of 5]

جميع فصول الكتاب عبارة عن جواهر صغيرة مصقولة، مقالات في صور مصغرة. ويأتي إحساسه الكوميدي بأشكال متنوعة. في بعض المشاهد التي يتصرف فيها بصبيانية مع خادمته الحكيمة والمريضة Joettetti يذكرنا بتصرفات شارلوك مع السيدة هدسون. في أحيان أخرى ينغمس في الكتابة الوصفية حول موضوعه، أو يعلن أنه لن يكتب فصلاً كاملاً عن زهوره الجافة – لأن ذلك بالكاد يستحق العناء – ثم يفعل ذلك. يصف النقوش على جداره، ويستنتج أن الرسم هو أنبل الفنون. وفي خضم الأعمال الدرامية والأحلام ورحلات الهوى والتأملات والتعليقات الاجتماعية التي تشكل معاني متعرجة، تنشأ أطول نكتة في الكتاب من فلسفة دي مايستر للروح والجسد. أو كما يسميها، “الروح والوحش”، أو “الروح والآخر”. ذلك أنه بينما يُحتجز “الآخر”، فإن روحه (أو عقله) يمكن أن تسافر إلى حيث تريد.
جزأ من مراجعة طويلة على~
Mate Review of Books

[Justin Evans · Rating 5 out of 5]

Utterly delightful, and exactly what it says it is. This is the kind of book that someone might write today, but lard it so heavily with reflections on how they're not writing fiction, but doing something like totally revolutionary that it would become tedious instead of astonishingly pleasant. Just holding this makes me smile, in memory the smiles I smiled as I read it.

[Viji (Bookish endeavors) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why five.? Well.. He managed to create such a weird stuff with such a few words.. And that's an accomplishment. The story did give me a positive thought-that you can turn a prison into a heaven by changing your perception of it. But I don't think he would have written all these things about that room had he resided in it for too long a time. And the thing about mirror.. That was real good.. To see oneself and soul and the other.. I do not how the materialists would respond to that but since I am not one,I can say that it was brilliant.. It seems I have written this review different from the way I usually write.. But that's how I really feel..!! I just browsed the ratings other readers gave to this book and saw mixed ratings and reviews,like it is for almost every book(except those which everybody wholeheartedly put under trash).. I am going to re-read this book.. I really want to see if I missed something.. May be an apple will fall on my head during the next read..

[Fabio · Rating 2 out of 5]

Brevi note:
- il mio francese ha bisogno d'una vigorosa spolverata (attenuante: trattasi di libricino di fine '700)
- l'aspetto umoristico - tanto apprezzato - mi sfugge completamente
- capisco che si possa sostenere la superiorità della pittura rispetto alla musica. Però no. Fortunatamente l'Autore riconosce il suo pre-giudizio - En commençant l'examen d'une question, on prend ordinairement le ton dogmatique, parce qu'on est décidé en secret, comme je l'étais réellement pour la peinture, malgré mon hypocrite impartialité
- qualche curiosa riflessione, soprattutto il système de l'ame et de la bête: l'homme est composé d'une ame et d'une bête.—Ces deux êtres sont absolument distincts, mais tellement emboîtés l'un dans l'autre, ou l'un sur l'autre, qu'il faut que l'ame ait une certaine supériorité sur la bête pour être en état d'en faire la distinction. Che è cosa affatto diversa dalla distinzione tra anima e corpo, in quanto la bête è un essere sensibile, vero e proprio individuo dotato di volontà, gusti, inclinazioni ed esistenza separate da quelle dell'anima. Talvolta le loro strade si separano temporaneamente: per esempio quando, dovendo andare a corte, ci si trova di fronte alla residenza di una fascinosa M.me; oppure lorsque vous lisez un livre, monsieur, et qu'une idée plus agréable entre tout à coup dans votre imagination, votre ame s'y attache tout de suite et oublie le livre, tandis que vos yeux suivent machinalement les mots et les lignes; vous achevez la page sans la comprendre et sans vous souvenir de ce que vous avez lu.—Cela vient de ce que votre ame, ayant ordonné à sa compagne de lui faire la lecture, ne l'a point avertie de la petite absence qu'elle allait faire; en sorte que l'autre continuait la lecture que votre ame n'écoutait plus.
- una non condivisibile (ma dichiaratamente di parte) asserzione della superiorità della pittura rispetto alla musica - si lamenta soprattutto il fatto che la musique est sujette à la mode, et la peinture ne l'est pas.—Les morceaux de musique qui attendrissaient nos aïeux sont ridicules pour les amateurs de nos jours: scrivi nel 1794, un secolo dopo la morte di Purcell, pochi decenni dopo quella di Bach, Handel e Vivaldi, con in piena attività Beethoven e Haydn, Mozart da poco scomparso... Non si parla di [rapida ricerca su Google] Fedez o Sfera Ebbasta. Suvvia!

(adatto al periodo) https://youtu.be/oBsZKF3mcv8

[Francis Papa · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book had potential. I liked a few of the early chapters and the author's description of the animal and the soul - these chapters had me looking forward to the rest of the book. After this the writing failed to capture my attention (part of this may be due to the language used). I also felt that the author was pompous which disinterested me in what he wrote about once he started to show his true colors.

[TeaButterfly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read in French. A Masterpiece, a tour-de-force of humor.

[Sunni | vanreads · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is full of ridiculous nonsense (in the most hilarious manner) and at times, philosophical musings. Would highly recommend right now for some pandemic fun.

[Andrew]

Long before Georges Perec and company, an imprisoned French official wrote a treatise describing his room as the world, and his adventures therein. It's the sort of thing I would doubtless think up if I was under house arrest. But what I particularly loved about it was that it was the sort of thing that Calvino or Robbe-Grillet or Eco would have thought up, the Savoyard militarist entering worlds of the imagination through mundane objects, and perhaps using that as a metaphor for some theme or turning point in the history of ideas, and I would have enjoyed it, heaps. But the fact that it's the genuine article... amazing.

[Cassandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my all time favorite books

[Jacob · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a gem. And there’s no better time to read this than while we’re all pent up in our own chambres avoiding spreading viruses.

Wildly digressive and playful while squinting seriously at a few subjects.

[Sheska · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although the idea of trying to describe one’s room (a parallelogram of thirty-six steps round) to a reader as some sort of grandiose circumnavigation voyage seems a bit pretentious, I am reluctant to call it such for the giddy enthusiasm with which it appears to have been written makes it a genuinely delightful read, though not without a splash of ostentation, which I found rather amusing and a good accompaniment to the author’s distinct sense of mirth.

The first part of the Voyage, had famously inspired Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis’ The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cuba – in the sense of its fragmentary structure and the narrators’ blithe and unpredictable flights of fancy the two are almost indistinguishable. Machado de Assis even borrowed De Maistre’s trailing ellipses around the “mound/hillock/the little hill” innuendo for his Adam and Eve chapter (which, from what I've read, may also be an allusion to Stern, whom I’m yet to read). At times, both authors lament their unrealised desires to embellish certain parts of the narrative – offhand comments which in and of themselves serve as embellishments – only to go off on another embellishing tangent. I loved that. That kind of butterfly brain style of writing has always appealed to me, which is probably why I was able to enjoy Joyce’s Ulysses so much. Interestingly, De Maistre himself alludes to the voyages of Ulysses when drawing his Nocturnal tale to a close, making this another satisfying coincidence that brings me back to Joyce.

Either way, I thoroughly enjoyed De Maistre’s writing, though I much preferred the Nocturnal journey to the 42-day one. I guess being a recluse by nature, this sort of attachment to one’s daily comforts is totally relatable and I was thrilled to read of another who took as much joy in their own surroundings (and the starry sky) as I tend to do. Because of this, I went on to read a number of articles dedicated to the Journey(s), all of which quoted the Blaise Pascal’s passage from the Pensées (139. Diversion) “I have discovered that all the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber.” So, now I’ve added Pensées to my ever-growing TBR list.

The most interesting of the articles was Alain de Botton’s How to Travel from Your Sofa, written at the start of the pandemic in an effort, I suppose, to encourage the readership to look inward and to appreciate the little joys in their lives. Whilst not a fan of the author, or, for that matter, the idea of using the Voyages as a civil pacification tool in the time of worldwide crisis, I did find his overall sentiments not without poignancy; I particularly appreciated the following conclusion, sans its claim to certainty:

“However playful, de Maistre’s work is inspired by a profound insight: that the pleasure we find in new places is perhaps dependent more on the mindset with which we travel than on the destination.”

Which brings me to De Maistre’s last story in the book - The Leper of the City of Aosta. Tonally, this was a complete departure from the droll style of the Voyages, yet, curiously, it touched on the same subject, i.e. that of confinement and finding things within your immediate surroundings to occupy yourself with. But what of the reason to live? This is where the Voyages and this story part, for the devastating and heart-breaking loneliness that pervades the story of the Leper is all but absent in the Voyages, where the narrator’s “confinement” is more or less self-imposed and not at all an unwelcome one. How does one overcome a forced and permanent confinement, though? What about the mindset that is being pulled toward giving up? “He who cherishes his cell shall find peace therein”, says the Leper. But has he found peace, the way the narrator of Voyages has, or does the staying hand of fear of Hell and being separated from his sister and God cruelly force him to endure the suffering and isolation, whilst surrounded with the taunting and rare beaty of his walled garden. This too hit pretty close to home and made me close this book with a sense of gratitude for having been taken on these two fascinating journeys.

[Anubha · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the room and about the world

I found out about this book while reading The Art of Travel by Alain De Botton. With the Covid-19 imposed quarantine, more and more people are shut in their houses and this book seemed more relevant than ever.
While the title says the book is about the voyage around the author's room, you will often encounter tales far removed from his room as his fancy takes flight.
This book is in turns funny, full of the fanciful description of the author's meditations, and rife with timeless observations about man and solitude.

[Maria Fernanda Gama · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd recommend this to everybody, everywhere, anytime. But I especially recommend it to people in isolation for a long period of time, possibly due to Covid, who feel as if their grip on reality is slowly giving up. To think that this was written while the author was in isolation in his room, without the internet, without Zoom, without a telephone to hear the voice of fellow humans, without the TV to distract him from his thoughts... I just feel like this was a soothing balm poured over me in a time when I desperately needed it. Maybe this can work the same way for you... I'd give it a try.

[Beverley · Rating 4 out of 5]

strange little book, but weirdly alluring in its monotonous setting.

[Osyth · Rating 5 out of 5]

In his preface to ‘Voyage Around My Room’ Joseph de Maitre, brother of the author, Xavier de Maitre writes: ‘Magellen, Drake, Anson, Cook, et alia were, no doubt, remarkable men; nevertheless, it is legitimate, and unless we are gravely mistaken, it is indeed our duty, to point out that the Voyage Around My Room possesses a particular merit that places it well above all preceding voyages’ (p.p. 183). Bold words indeed. It is interesting to ponder why the older de Maitre was so convinced of the merit of the tome that he took it upon himself to publish it without consulting his brother.
Confined to his room for forty-two days for fighting a duel, presumably successfully, when serving in the Savoyard army in 1790, the narrator uses his captivity to take us on a voyage around his room. In essence it is a witty pastiche of the travel chronicles that abounded in the era: ‘No, I will no longer keep my book in petto: here it is, gentlemen. Read it. I have just completed a forty-two-day voyage around my room. The fascinating observations I made and the endless pleasures I experienced along the way made me wish to share my travels with the public; and the certainty of having something useful to offer convinced me to do so’ (p.p. 3) As well as being an educated caricature of a popular form, it is a philosophical essay, a self-examination, a meditation on the worth of life and love and the joy of our surroundings, our relationships and interactions with others, of our place in the order of things.
At less than eighty pages, it is a slender volume. Nonetheless, the reader is taken on a genuinely epic journey visiting art, music, philosophy, science, myth and mood by turn. As the narrative unfolds we understand that, in the main, the narrator is enjoying his incarceration, his solitude, rather than feeling punished.
Early in his account, we are introduced to the narrator’s theory, dogma even, that human beings are governed by two distinct internal entities to which he attributes character: ‘I have noticed, through many and sundry observations, that man is made up of a soul and a beast. These two beings are absolutely distinct, yet so contained within one another, or rather on top of one another that the soul must in some way be superior to the beast to be able to make such a distinction’ (p.p. 11). This notion, this metaphysical observation is never far away as we travel through the narrator’s time in his room. Moreover soul and beast (otherwise called ‘the other’) become personalities who have control of the narrator’s equilibrium: ‘…the imagination loses its way along the silent paths of this ideal land; the bluish distance blends into the sky, and the whole landscape mirrored in the waters of a tranquil river, creates a spectacle that no language can describe: As my soul was reflecting thus, the other continued on his way, and God knows where he was going! Instead of repairing to the court, as he had been ordered to do, he drifted so far to port that by the time my soul caught up, he was at Mme de Hautcastel’s front door, a half-mile from the king’s palace. I shall leave it to the reader to imagine what would have happened had I let my beast enter, alone, the house of so lovely a lady’ (p.p. 13/14)
The narrator, given his high birth (he is a Count), is not in a cell but rather in a fine and spacious apartment and is not entirely alone. He has Joanetti, his faithful and long-suffering manservant to attend to him and with whom he gently spars: ‘Joanetti was still in the same position, awaiting the explanation he had asked of me. I raised my head from the folds of my traveling coat into which I had plunged it to meditate with greater ease’ (p.p. 24) He also has the companionship of his adored dog: ‘My dear Rosine, who has never offered me any service, has done me the greatest service that can be rendered to humanity: she has loved me before, and she still loves me now. Moreover - and I am not afraid to say it - I love her with a bit of the same sentiment that I accord my friends.’ (p.p. 28)
Appreciative that we have opted to let him guide us on this journey, he revels in showing us his beautiful works of art, his books, his writing desk. He is delightfully discursive and somewhat whimsy in his approach to description. He loves art above music, feeling that art is something that we must mature in order to excel at, whereas music can be played by gifted children, still naïve in every other way: ‘We have seen children play the harpsichord like great masters, but we have never seen a twelve-year-old who was a good painter. Painting, beyond taste and feeling, requires a thoughtful mind, which musicians can do without’ (p.p. 38) Moreover, he feels that a positively odious person can produce beautiful music whereas in his mind it takes a beauty of spirit to be able to paint something pleasing to the eye: ‘Every day we see thoughtless, heartless men draw bewitching sounds from a violin or harp ….. on the other hand one cannot paint even the simplest thing in the world without the soul’s employing all its faculties’ (p.p. 38) Additionally, he feels that art is not at the effect of fashion in the way that music is, music tastes come and go and once passé become risible and discordant to a more modern ear.
As he takes our hand and leads us round his quarters he lets us glimpse his moods. He is an emotional man, at the effect of his current love object, Madame de Hautcastel; missing his sister who has not replied to a letter he wrote her a year ago; mourning the loss of a man who was becoming his very dear friend and was a comrade in the war being fought: ‘I saw him exposed to all the perils of war, a disastrous war. Death seemed to spare us each for the other; it took aim at him a thousand times without ever hitting the mark but this was only to make his loss more painful to me’ (p.p. 32) As he lets the reader into his heart and his mind, he gives clues as to how he has found himself in this predicament though he refuses to overtly clarify so the reader can wonder as to whether the duel was fought over his mistress, a somewhat fickle and vain woman who he nevertheless delights in: ‘For a time I held a second mirror in front of her, so she could better judge her appearance; and as her figure was selected back and forth, from one mirror to the other, I saw at that moment an infinite perspective of coquettes, none of which paid any attention to me’ (p.p. 54). His effete rambling has the effect of opening up the mind of the reader to possibilities outside of the observations he is making.
It is never the objects in the room: his clothes, his bed, his chair, his desk, even his paintings, that are the heart of the matter. The crux of the journey is for the narrator to reflect upon and share his philosophy and his ideologies. Europe was a constantly sparring territory at the time. Italy as we know it was a series of provinces and parts of modern France were independent territories. His father is buried in his homeland but he can no longer visit his grave: ‘O my father! Do you know that your children have been banished from the very country you served with such zeal and integrity for sixty years? Do you know that they are forbidden to visit your grave? Yet tyranny could not take from them the most precious part of your heritage, the memory of your virtues and the power of your example’ (p.p. 61) he declares when introducing us to his most cherished possession, a bust of his father: ‘What an excellent likeness! There, indeed, one sees the features that nature gave to the most virtuous of men’ (p.p. 61)
I expected a minutely detailed account of the furnishings and decor of a room, what I got was an exquisitely crafted exposé of a man forced to live in isolation, whilst outside the Turin Carnival is in full swing. I trusted the narrator implicitly and, quickly felt that I knew him intimately. When the incarceration finally ends, and he takes to the street, I worried about this fragile, somewhat fay creature walking in the terrestrial world again, a feeling amplified by his own words: ‘Meanwhile, never have I been more keenly aware of my double nature. Even as I regret the loss of my imaginary pleasures, I feel consoled in spite of myself: a mysterious force compels me - it tells me I am in need of air and sky, and that solitude resembles death’ (p.p. 78)
In exploring the psyche through a forced isolation, the imagination is laid bare, the true feelings of the protagonist are revealed and through a veil of mild madness, sadness and occasional resentment, we are privy to the most intimate workings of a man’s mind. The conversational, inclusive style of the narration works perfectly, the reader feeling truly the confidante. The book is an invitation to be privy to the narrators most intimate thoughts and feelings. Being erudite and extremely well-educated, the narrator’s invitation is gilt-edged.
In addition to his fanciful language, the joy of this little sojourn is in the relationship that the narrator has to the cast he assembles. His servant, his dog, his lover, his father and his friend both dead, his much missed and admired sister, his authors, painters, poets and philosophers, his statesmen and physicians all are alive on the page. It is a masterclass in finding the value in the way things are.

[Graychin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written during his forty-two days confinement for dueling in 1790, Xavier de Maistre’s book owes a lot to Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy, both in terms of style and spirit. Sterne’s is the better book, but there is something darkly fascinating in the horror that creeps now and then into de Mastre’s little volume. Consider, for example, this passage added in 1794, with an eye toward the French Revolution in its nasty phase:

Do you enjoy yourselves as much as you used to at a ball or at the theater? – For my part, I must say that for some time now, any large gathering of people inspires a kind of terror in me… When I am at one of those balls, amidst that crowd of amiable, handsome people dancing and singing – people who weep at tragedies, who express only joy, candor, and cordiality – I say to myself: - What if suddenly a white bear, a philosopher, a tiger, or some other animal of that sort were to join this polite gathering, go up to the orchestra and shout madly: "Wretched humans! Hearken to the truth that speaks through me: you are oppressed a tyrannized; you are unhappy; you are bored. – Rouse yourselves from your sleep!

“You, musicians, begin by smashing your instruments over your heads; let each man arm himself with a dagger; think no more of entertainment, of parties; go up into the boxes and slit everyone’s throat; and let the women also soak their timid hands in blood.

“Go now, you are free, wrest your king from his throne and your God from his sanctuary.’

-Well! How many of these charming people would carry out what the tiger said? – How many were perhaps already thinking about it before he entered? Who knows? – Were they not dancing in Paris five years ago?

[1.1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent collection, with the good kind of 18th century writing and so many stray avenues of thought and inquiry that it should create reminiscences for those who have faced times of isolation and refused to be bored or self-pitying. Some of the collection is heartfelt, some is merely slapstick, some is half-serious pondering, some is serious pondering, and some is surprisingly dark—and there's many allusions to figures only a classicist would remember, thankfully with notes for those of us who lack the erudition. There's even a section that's a dialogue! Will wonders never cease...

My friend gave me this volume just before the great Third Wave Shutdown of March 2021, and it took me till the late summer to read it. Alas, that's life, and the greater freedoms did not detract from my enjoyment while reading.

This is a unique and interesting read, clearly in part written as an homage to Tristram Shandy, what with the digressions and discursiveness, and plenty to inspire introspection. Is it fiction or non-fiction, though? That's a tough call. It's a travelogue through one's thoughts, in many ways, which would make it neither wholly one nor the other, in my opinion.

[CuriousBookReviewer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Curiosity level: very very entertaining! Wish it was longer!

"Was it this to punish me that they confined me to my room? One might as well exile a mouse to a granary." -p.78

Xavier de Maistre, having found guilty of duelling, is confined to his room for 42 days. While most of us might start chewing off our nails (w/o WiFi), he dreams up worlds. The bed, the mirror, the desk - all come alive in animation... breathing out stories.

Xavier essentially wants to tell the reader this: You don't need your passport, luggage or money for an adventure! You can organise a voyage around your room! Written in a deadpan yet enthusiastic humour-style, this book reminds me of a hilarious George Orwell and Umberto Eco combo :)

"They may have forbidden me to travel through a city, but they left me the entire universe: infinity and eternity are at my command."

P.s he also wrote a part 2: nocturnal expeditions around my room

[Gini · Rating 4 out of 5]

A strange title and unknown author hasn't been a good mix for me in the past, but this one worked out wonderfully.
Seems the author was placed on house arrest for dueling, needed something to occupy his time and wrote to fill the hours. Reminded me of journal entries, although somewhere I read it was a parody of a popular style of the era. Short musings on various themes, topics, subjects. His confinement ends. He emerges changed.
The second set of writings is similar, but mature as he continues to write. The final section differs from the journal type entries and is a touching portrayal of a leper. (I wonder if some of the dialog there comes from his own experience of isolation?) Whether it does or not, you may need some tissues for it.
A surprise find that I quite enjoyed.

[Einzige · Rating 4 out of 5]

Part of the charm of these stories are simply that they were written by Joseph de Maistre’s brother (who seems to have a surprisingly strong interest in feet). Now if you don’t know who Joseph de Maistre is, congratulations you probably spend healthy amounts of time on the internet. For a rough analogy imagine if Oscar Wilde was the brother of Karl Marx.

As for the stories themselves they are witty and charming, though unfortunately as it progresses the colourful travel analogies are dropped.

One final note if you do find the voyages slow or not to your taste at least give the tale of the leper – a very touchy story of loneliness.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

wrecked me. absolutely wrecked me. I want to throw up and cry this book is so good and made me so emotional. originally planned to include a more academic-style review of the first book within this volume but after reading the second and third inclusions and thinking about them I just can’t bring myself to do that. I kin this book. do you know how down bad I have to be to kin a book? I see myself reflected in this book in ways which are perverse, hopeful, perverse in their hope. this book came to me at the perfect time in my life and now I feel empty because I have to move on

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

Impulse-bought this at a used bookstore, and read a quarter of it before I got home. The first half was amusing and I enjoyed it. It was written when the author was in his twenties and was under house arrest. The second half was written when the author was in his sixties, I think, and I found it dull. I’m not sure whether it was due to the fact that this time he was voluntarily confining himself, or because he was old and rambling (as opposed to young and rambling), but I liked it much less.

[Tomek · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eriting of a guy that is doing nothing for 42 days. It's not so boring as one might expect

[Kellean · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some great passages but overall dry and humdrum.

[amanda teixeira · Rating 5 out of 5]

esse livrinho é genial! um grande deboche dos relatos de viajantes.

[Wendy Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great choice for lockdown. Surprisingly, warm witty and relatable for a text written in the late 18th century by an anti-revolutionary aristocrat.

[ipek · Rating 3 out of 5]

xavier sn bana dha basta otobuste okurken suan odandasin diyerek kaybettinNnNnnn

[Cait · Rating 3 out of 5]

I give this 3.5 stars. I will give this another read when the time is right