La poétique de François Villon by David Kuhn

Medieval Academy of America
La poétique de François Villon by David Kuhn
Review by: Raphael Levy
Speculum, Vol. 44, No. 1 (Jan., 1969), pp. 151-153
Published by: Medieval Academy of America
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Reviews
151
The riseand rise of thisecclesiasticaladventurerstillremainsto be analyzed.
Miss Ady's biographystandsas a valuable guideforthosesearchingout theideas
and thoughtsofthiskey Renaissancefigure.Few men in pre-modern
timeshave
gainedsuchstatusas Aeneasand leftsuch an abundantrecordoftheirsentiments
as they climbed.Yet no seriousefforthas been made to fuse the thoughtand
emotionofthisman. In thisparticularstudywe have an able introduction
to his
criticalthinkingon mattersof law and jurisprudence- theoriesconcerningthe
nature of the public world. How temptingto ask that this familiarterrainbe
combinedwith the seldom reconnoiteredinner continentsof this quattrocento
pope ofsuchbaffling
simplicity.So muchofthedisjunctureofhis own timeslives
in his voluminouswritings.Any such attemptshouldincludeimportantmonographsby the Italians G. Paparelli and F. Battaglia.
MARVIN B. BECKER
UniversityofRochester
DAVID
KUHN,La poNtique
deFranQoi8Villon.Paris:Armand
Colin,1967.Paper.Pp. 508.
THi author'spointof departureis revealedin his conclusion:
L'antiquiten'avaitpas leguea Villonunepoetiquecoherente.
Villonen a eu une,mais
aucunecrittheorique
nel'a legueea nousnonplus.Sonepoqueheritadesauteurslatinsune
Son 6poqueheritaaussi,des rheteurs
latinset des Peresde l'Rglise,un souci
rhetorique.
esthetique.
L'esthetique
et la rhetorique
encadrent
A l'epoquela poetiquesansla toucher
(p. 465).
Of course,the peculiarpoetryofFrangoisVillonhas evokedprofoundresearchby
literarycriticsfordecades. Nevertheless,la po6tiqueis not treatedspecificallyin
any one of the extensivemonographsstartingwiththat of Thuasne in 1923 via
thoseof Siciliano,Rice, Ziwes,Brunelliup to that of Fox in 1962.
The ideologicalpart of the presentationderives primarilyfromthe original
dans l'cole des Chartres(Paris,
studiesby J. M. Parent,La doctrine
de la cre'ation
1938): R. Klibansky,The Continuity
of thePlatonic TraditionduringtheMiddle
Ages (London, 1939): A. M. F. Gunn, The Mirror of Love (Lubbock, 1952).
This philosophicdoctrineemanatedfromthe Platonic naturalismin the Middle
Ages. Its thought-pattern
commonlyreceivesthe label School of Chartres.It
left traces throughoutEurope; in France, its chiefproponentswere Alain de
Lille,Jeande Meun, and FrangoisVillon.Here we encounter
l'unedes presuppositions
de la penseemoraleet,par consequent,
de la poetiquedu XVe
s'estexcluede la loi,de la logique,et du langagequifont
siecle:que la societedeshommes
l'unitede l'universet qui assurentson existencememe.... L'alienationde la nature
le dilemme
classiquedu
ressentie
parceluiqui se saitplusnaturelque lesautresconstitue
poeteau tempsde Villon(p. 266).
David Kuhn intendsto blaze a new trail in la po6tiquewhile profitingconstantlyby the valuable publicationsdealing with otheraspects of Villoniana.
He is eager to let the poet speak for himselfbecause, as he admits candidly,
"le sens de maint vers et d'une foulede mots nous echappe" (p. 8). Two-thirds
of the book under review deal with "La Fable, la Fonction et la Forme du
Testament" by presentinga syntactical-structural-stylistic
synthesis. Signifi-
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152
Reviews
cant expressionslead to a broad commentarywith tangential comparisons
which yield numerouspornographicinnuendoes.The documentationhereand elsewhere- is ample forliteraryreferences,
but forthesekey-wordsit can
be supplementedby consultingthe bibliographicalalphabet in the Revue de
linguistique
romane,xxx (1966), 390-414.
The firstchapter analyzes in great detail the twenty-sixautobiographical
words of the Quatrain. The deduction made by Kuhn is that the Quatrain
permitsVillon "d'accuser la perversionde l'ordre actuel en la juxtaposant a
un ordreideal qu'il trahitet dont il temoignepar son 6lognement"(p. 20). The
second chapteroffersa minuteexplicationof the Ballade de la GrosseMargot,
which ordinarilyprovokesa violent reaction.This ballad of the prostituteis
earthlyand coarse juxtaposingclothing,utensils,food,parts of the body,pieces
of wood, domesticanimals with bordeau(used fourtimes),ordure,ung grospet.
Kuhn does not findit far-fetched
to attributeto the ballad the threeunities:
"Ce drame-cisembleraitplus prochedu theAtreclassique que de la farcepopulaire" (p. 27).
La Ballade de NotreDame, whichrevealsthe name ofthe authorin an acrostic,
transportsus into a quiet, spiritualatmosphere.Villon'smother,now absorbed
in prayer,"n'a pas eu la chancede pouvoirenfantersans peche commela Vierge
portant sans rompureencourir."The mother,given the epithets pecheresse,
jangleresse,povrette,
humble,repeats the refrain:"En ceste foyje vueil vivre et
mourir."Consequently,Villonfeltno need to make any othercontrastbetween
the real and the ideal (p. 58).
Questionsde Neige (pp. 76-97) illustratebest the perceptiveacumen of Kuhn.
They are rhetoricalapparentlyallowingus to "participera un debat logique
sans que nous puissionsarrivera d'autres conclusionsque celle qui est deja
presupposeecommelogique et universelle."Woman incarnatesthe traditional
image of the humanbody as it passes fromlifeto death in a gradualmanneror
in a hectic manner.Villon's cumulativeubi sunt questionsgo up and up, via
Thais, HeloYse,and Blanche de Bourgogne,until they reach the Virgin,"la
femmela plus fertileque le monde ait connuepuisqu'elleenfantaDieu et opera
une transformation
universelle."
Kuhn enumeratespossible definitionsof the title Lais withoutarrivingat a
choice:
(1) poesielyrique;(2) contrat
legal;(8) choselaisseeoulegueeparderni6re
volonte;(4) une
debienspersonnels
distribution
d'uneriviere;(5) injure,
quiprogresse
commelesalluvions
outrage,offense,
tort;(6) chosequi causedu d6shonneur;
(7) fientede b6tesauvage(p.
109).
I would choose withouthesitationthe third definitionby recallingthe mediaeval je lais in the sense of "je legue,je fais un legs." Le Lais, whichis dated
1456 and whichoffersmany choicebits of literaryeroticism,is said to indicate
creativitywhichwillendowtheobjectiveworldwitha magicpower.
A fewdetailscall forcomment.
Kuhnprefers
Clement
Marot's1533editionto therecentC. F. M. A. editionofLongnon.
Foulet.Manyreaderswillbe shockedto readthatthelattereffort
'a ete d'edulcorer
ce
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153
Review8
texte,de lui 6terson amertumeraisonn6equi est son sel' (p. 921).Ratherthansinkbetween
Scylla and Charybdis,Kuhn presentsthe texton pages 18, 24, 42, 99, etc., verydiplomaticallydevoid of punctuation(except on page 76). The elusivetermjambot(p. 41) is explained in my Contribution
d la lexicographie
frangaiseselond'ancienstextesd'originejuive
(Syracuse,1960), 400-403. The notes forchapterIII carrythe pertinentliteratureup to
theyear1959; subsequentstudieshave been publishedby F. Lecoy,Romania,LXXX (1959),
493-514; J. Maries, Revueling.rom.,xxvi (1962), 165-169; R. Terdiman,PMLA, Lxxxii
(1967), 622-633. The discussionon mythologyin JeanMolinet (p. 79) was writtenbefore
that of F. Joukovsky-Micha,
Rom. Phil., xxi (1968), 286-302, but the precisedefinition
foressoyne(p. 82) had been givenby L. Cons, Mod. Lang. Notes,LVII (1942), 527. Anent
'l'auteur du premierromande Berteau grantpie, un nomm6Adenes' (p. 94), Kuhn mentionsthe 1832 editionofPaulin Paris; thebest editionis that ofAlbertHenry,Les Oeuvres
d'Adenetle Roi: Berteaus granspies (Bruxelles,1963). Kuhn notesthesymbolicconnotationsof termssuch as escouvillon
used in Le Lais 316 (pp. 122-129). He overlooks"chevaucheurd'escouvetes"in Le Testament668 withreference
to a witchpurportedto set out
astridea broomontheSabbath.This legendwas perpetuatedinthesixteenth
andseventeenth
centuriesas is relatedin HenryHavard's Dictionnairede l'ameublement
etde la decoration,
i (Paris, 1894), 311.
Kuhn's enthusiastic appreciation of 3300 lines of fascinating poetry reaches
its apogee by his making Villon into another national monument (p. 316). This
reviewer of La poetique de Franpois Villon hesitates, however, to subscribe to the
exhortation:
de la voix,la violence
Son desordre,l'absence de suitedans les idees,I'allureprimesautiere
- cela s6duit et convainc le lecteurau lieu de le rendreperplexe....
des retournemefits
Sacbons grea Villond'avoirtente,dans sa visiondu reel,une visiontotalequi resiste- par
sa complexitequi inclutl'indicible-aux sch6masfaciles(pp. 344, 345, 253).
RAPHAEL LEVY
ofTexasat Austin
University
LEVEY, MedicalEthicsofMedievalIslam withSpecial Reference
toal-Ruhdwi's
PracticalEthics
of the Physician. (Transactionsof the AmericanPhilosophicalSociety,New Series,57, 3, 1967.)
Philadelphia,Pennsylvania:The AmericanPhilosophicalSociety,1967. Paper. Pp. 100. $3.
MARTIN
IT is interesting
to note that an importantbook on "the ethicsof the physician"
such as thisone by al-Ruhawi (completedin the late ninthcentury)shouldhave
been neglectedforsome time,and then,suddenlyreceiveenthusiasticattention.
Of course,I am referring
hereto thisexcellentworkby ProfessorLevey, and the
interestingand penetratingstudiesmade recentlyby Dr ChristophBiirgel (see
for example his article, "Die Bildung des Arzte, eine arabische Schriftzum
'airztlichen
Leben' aus dem 9 Jahrhundert,
1. Das 'airztlichen
Leben' innerhalb
der islamischenKultur und seine Erforschung,"SudhoffsArchiv,50 (1966),
37-360).
At the ZahiriyahLibrary,I foundanothertext (ms no. 4883, pt. 2) with a
closerconnectionthan al-Ruhawf'sto the teachingand practiceof medicineto
deontology.It has anotheradvantage of being a conciseand brieftreatise.It is
bound with an incompletecopy of 'Uyuinal-Anbd'by Usaybi'ah who was well
acquainted with the Raha.wi's work. Like that of al-RuhawI, this thirteenth
centurytreatise(in fivechapters),describesthe virtuesof the healingart and
thefinequalitiesthephysicianshouldpossess.Noteworthyis thechapterdevoted
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