Michel Serres on Virtue

In the opening lines of Morales espiègles, a short work published only a few months before the end of his life, Michel Serres writes that he intends to venture ‘on tip toe’ into the ‘exotic land’ of morals (Morales espiègles 7). His reticence may bring a wry smile to some of his readers since questions regarding life, human life, and how it can be lived run openly through much of his work. Violence and peace are recurrent themes, as are those of multiplicity, relations, communication and restraint whose bearing on ethics is less direct, though no less significant. The fact that Serres’ writing on ethics is scattered here and there through his work is in no way a sign that he did not take it seriously.