Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) was born in Geneva, and eventually ends up in Paris. His mother died 10 later of complications of his birth, and his father was a watchmaker. When his father challenged a man to duel, and the man saw his father as an inferior, he fled to avoid jail and Rousseau was sent to poor relatives. He ends up being taken in by a Madame de Warens who would become his lover. He is a secretary to a diplomat in Venice, where he's repulsed by Zulietta's misshapen nipple, and then in Paris he's attached to Theresa Levasseur . Some make his uneasy relationships and his unpopularity begin in relationships. He sees civilization as corrupting, and wants to bring back in emotions when rationality was being trumpeted. He helped transition from the renaissance to the enlightenment , two huge thought movements of europe. He united people against him, and did not see society as progressing. His going against the prevailing winds made him appreciated in Paris inte...