Le Triumphe des Vertuz , second traité: Le Triumphe de Force by Jean Thenaud (review)

Abstract

982 Reviews self-consciousness, the literary culture of Renaissance Lyons, the rise and evolution of the Pleiade, and poetry designed to promote the glory of France. Love poetry makes several appearances in these chapters. Poetry on scientific subjects is dealt with in the final section, as are polemical works, sharply polarized along religious and political lines. At this point, Rigolot broaches the vexed questions of mannerism and the baroque, eschewing tight definitions, but none the less illuminating the mat? ter through examples. An 'Apres-propos' charts the posthumous fate of the Pleiade. Throughout the book the discussions are illustrated by subtle and precise critical analyses of passages from the leading poets of the day. These bear witness to the author's erudition and perceptiveness, and often show originality in unexpected jux? tapositions or a particular focus. As the readership envisaged is the educated general public (French-speaking), help is given in a number of ways. Rigolot does not shy away from using technical terms, but defines them clearly as they occur; in addition there is a substantial glossary containing, on the one hand, words that have fallen out of use or whose meaning has changed since the sixteenth century, and, on the other, explanations of certain concepts and references to mythological or historical figures. The spelling is modernized in the extensive quotations fromRenaissance authors, and footnotes have been eliminated, apart from a few referringsimply to other chapters of this book, without specific references. It would have been helpful to have precise citations to support the statements representing the views of the numerous critics mentioned. Instead, we must be content to findtheir names in brackets each time and to seek their works in the full bibliographies that follow each chapter. Although not addressed to students, this book will in factprovide them, as well as the general reader, with an excellent and wide-ranging introduction to the French poetry of the Renais? sance in a relatively small compass. Much will interest specialists in the field also. Lancaster University Elizabeth Vinestock Le Triumphe des Vertuz, second traite: Le Triumphe de Force. By Jean Thenaud. Ed. by Titia J. Schuurs-Janssen and Rene E. V. Stuip. Geneva: Droz. 2002. ?52. lxxviii + 371 pp. ISBN 2-600-00686-9. As a literary genre, 'mirrors for princes'?books intended to instruct rulers on how best to govern?had become well established by the early sixteenth century. Those written by Guillaume Bude and Claude de Seyssel for the young Francois I are well known. Far less familiar is Jean Thenaud's Triumphe des Vertuz, whose impor? tance has only been recognized since Anne-Marie Lecoq drew attention to it in her Francois Ier imaginaire { Paris: Macula, 1987). The author was a Franciscan friar attached to the entourage of Francois's formidable mother, Louise de Savoie. She commissioned him to write various educational books for her two children, Marguerite d'Angoulemeand Francois, and he spent several years doing so afterhis return from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Le Triumphe de Force, written in 1516-17, is the second part of a work in praise of four virtues. The present editors have already published an edition of Le Triumphe de Prudence (Geneva: Droz, 1997) and there are two more virtues to come: Justice and Temperance. Force is appropriately the virtue which ap? plies more particularly to Francois I, to whom this part of the work is dedicated. It is the virtue which enables the prince to overcome the whims of the corresponding vice of Fortune. She may appear invincible but can be tamed by reliance on divine providence . As a typical 'rhetoriqueur', Thenaud cultivates a tiresomely obscure, allusive, and self-consciously learned style. He draws on a wide range of sources, both pagan and Christian, including Petrarch, Erasmus, St Jerome, Horace, Ovid, Plutarch, and Pliny. He also indulges in the most shameless flatteryof his patron. Louise is de? scribed as 'superinclite dame' and is the goddess who appears in a dream that he has MLRy 98.4, 2003 983 while resting on Mount Sinai. She urges Thenaud, who calls himself TExplorateur', to follow the course of the River Nile to its source in Paradise by placing himself under...