How to Live:  Or a Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer

2011年美國全國書評人協會（NBCC）傳記獎。
與其說這本書是傳記，不如說是跨越世紀的愉快分享。－－The New York Times。
能讓新的讀者認識到蒙田的生活和思想，甚至激發他們的好奇心，進而閱讀更多有關古希臘哲學家的著作。這是一部偉大的散文。－－ 舊金山書評。
活潑，引人入勝，優美的英文，認識蒙田這位法國作家。－－The Times Literary Supplement。
本書將歐洲近代散文之父蒙田的人生劃分為20篇章節，經由這20段蒙田的生命歷程來回應 ”How to Live“，讀者透過作者如詩的優美文字來了解蒙田內心的達觀寧靜，經由蒙田這位生命導師的故事來頓悟生命的意義，是一部難得一見的心靈傳記書，沒有說教，只有寧靜與自覺；無怪乎《紐約客》讚譽作者「出色地、生動地、融合了蒙田哲學中心思想與生平軼事」。
Brilliant, original, funny and moving — a vivid portrait of Montaigne, showing how his ideas gave birth to our modern sense of our inner selves, from Shakespeare's plays to the dilemmas we face today.How to get on well with people, how to deal with violence, how to adjust to losing someone you love — such questions arise in most people's lives. They are all versions of a bigger question: how do you live? How do you do the good or honourable thing, while flourishing and feeling happy?This question obsessed Renaissance writers, none more than Michel Eyquem de Montaigne (1533-92), perhaps the first truly modern individual. A nobleman, public official and wine-grower, he wrote free-roaming explorations of his thought and experience, unlike anything written before. He called them 'essays', meaning 'attempts' or 'tries'. Into them he put whatever was in his head: his tastes in wine and food, his childhood memories, the way his dog's ears twitched when it was dreaming, as well as the appalling events of the religious civil wars raging around him. The Essays was an instant bestseller, and over four hundred years later, Montaigne's honesty and charm still draw people to him. Readers come to him in search of companionship, wisdom and entertainment — and in search of themselves.This book, a spirited and singular biography (and the first full life of Montaigne in English for nearly fifty years), relates the story of his life by way of the questions he posed and the answers he explored. It traces his bizarre upbringing (made to speak only Latin), youthful career and sexual adventures, his travels, and his friendships with the scholar and poet Etienne de La Boétie and with his adopted 'daughter', Marie de Gournay. And as we read, we also meet his readers — who for centuries have found in Montaigne an inexhaustible source of answers to the haunting question, 'how to live?'