A film screening and presentation of research on the history of “Rousseau’s Cave”, the garden hermitage at Wootton Hall in Staffordshire, where Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote the first half of his “Confessions”.

3.30pm

Stephen Leach and Stephen Hilyard (University of Wisconsin Madison)
‘Remember a Poor Hermit’: A Reconstruction of ‘Rousseau’s Cave’ (including showing of short film about Rousseau’s Cave at Wootton Hall in Staffordshire).
Discussion led by Jenny Mander (Newnham College, Cambridge)

From March 1766 to May 1767 Jean-Jacques Rousseau – fleeing from persecution in France and Switzerland – stayed in the remote hamlet of Wootton in Staffordshire. There he wrote the first half of his Confessions in a garden hermitage, a structure half natural and half architectural, ever since known as ‘Rousseau’s Cave.’ Our paper records the hermitage in its current state (exposed to the elements); it creates a digital reconstruction of the hermitage as it was in Rousseau’s lifetime; and it provides digital access to a monument that is otherwise not generally accessible. Through high-quality digital reconstructions, recreating the hermitage as it is now and as it was in Rousseau’s lifetime, we provide a new perspective upon the creation of one of the world’s greatest works of literature. At the same time, in providing an accurate record of a modest but fairly typical eighteenth century garden hermitage we hope to contribute to the study of garden hermitages and to the history of eighteenth century gardens.

Tea and coffee will be served at 4.30pm.

5.00pm

Roundtable on Rousseau’s Politics of Taste (Edinburgh University Press, 2024) by Jared Holley (University of Edinburgh)
Discussants: Jane Cooper (All Souls College, Oxford), Holly Rowe (Lincoln College, Oxford), and Olivier Higgins (New College, Oxford)
Response by Jared Holley

A small wine reception will follow the event.