He studied under Albert Thibaudet and Marcel Raymond and after working as a French lecturer in Halle and Munich, became professor at the University of Geneva.
Under the signs of the sorceress Circe and the ornamental peacock (paon), and following the art historical analysis of Heinrich Wölfflin, Rousset explored movement, instability, ostentation, decoration and metamorphosis in the plays, novels and poetry of the period.
He would return to the same period in his L’Intérieur et l’extérieur : essais sur la poésie et le théâtre au XVIIe siècle.
Distancing himself from the phenomenological approach of his friends and associates Georges Poulet and Jean-Pierre Richard, Rousset focussed on formal elements such as narrative structure in determining the meaning of a work.
His "Leurs yeux se rencontrèrent" : la scène de première vue dans le roman explored the common place of "love at first sight" in the novel.