Includes bibliographical references (p. [499]-549 ) and index.

The loneliness of a gifted child -- The end of innocence -- "I desired a happiness of which I had no idea" -- Rousseau finds a mother -- A year of wandering -- In Maman's house -- The idyll of Les Charmettes -- Broadening horizons : Lyon and Paris -- The masks of Venice -- A life partner and a guilty secret -- A writer's apprenticeship -- The beginnings of fame -- Rousseau's originality -- Lionized in Geneva, alienated in Paris -- An affair of the heart -- The break with the Enlightenment -- Peace at last, and the triumph of Julie -- Rousseau the controversialist : Emile and the social contract -- Exile in the mountains -- Another expulsion -- In a strange land -- The past relived -- Into the self-made labyrinth -- The final years in Paris.