(ca. 1494-1553) comic novelist
During the late 15th and early 16th centuries, the new ideas and intellectual attitudes of the renaissance were pouring out of Italy and sweeping through Europe. The spread of knowledge fostered a new humanist scholarship, which was changing the way people think. humanism caused a shift away from the focus of religious ways of thinking and, aided by the rediscovery of the knowledge of ancient Greece and Rome, turned scholars toward an in-depth study of human beings. The recent invention of the printing press allowed writers to produce works more quickly and in greater numbers than ever before. One of the most profound thinkers of this stimulating period was the French writer Francois Rabelais.
Little is known of Rabelais’s public life, and even less of his private life. Studies have revealed that his father was a lawyer in Chinon in the Loire valley and that he influenced his son’s study of law. Rabelais, however, found that the law was not a profession that suited him; he decided instead to join the Franciscan monastery of Le Puy Saint-Martin in Fontenay-le-Comte in 1510. He remained there, gaining a solid education, until 1524. Evidence suggests that during this time he began translating Greek philosopher Lucian’s works into Latin, but the translation is no longer extant. Because the Franciscans frowned upon Greek philosophy, Rabelais moved to the Benedictine monastery Saint-Pierre-de-Maillezais some time around 1523 or 1524.
Through his studies with the Benedictines, Rabelais became well versed in Greek and Latin and received a broad education in law, philosophy, and the classics. He abandoned his holy orders, however, to pursue a secular life. In the early 1530s, he studied medicine at the University of Montpellier, where he translated the works of Hippocrates and Galen from the original Greek and Latin. After completing his medical education, he began a career as a doctor and published several medical works no longer extant. By this time, he had come under the influence of the great humanist scholar Desiderius Erasmus, who inspired Rabelais and perhaps turned his thoughts toward a literary life.
In 1532 Rabelais produced his first book, Pan-tagruel, which he wrote under the fictitious name of Alcofribas Nasier. The character Pantagruel was known in popular French culture as a small devil; in Rabelais’s work, he is transformed into a giant who, in later books, becomes the symbol of wisdom, a foil for the character Panurge, who is foolish and self-absorbed, and who also appears in Rabelais’s later work Tiers livre. Pantagruel is a comic story about a giant who spreads thirst. It was an immediate success, despite being criticized by at least one professor at the Sorbonne, the leading university of France.
After a trip to Rome, Rabelais produced his second book, Gargantua, in 1534. The character Gar-gantua is the father of Pantagruel, and their stories are similar in the telling of their lives, as children, warriors, and heroes. Gargantua was also a comic story but differed from Pantagruel in that Ra-belais’s use of language as a means to express his views on some of the controversial issues then shaking Europe became more imaginative and inventive. His comic tale, set within an ideal society (based loosely on Thomas more’s Utopia), includes a battle in which Rabelais satirizes the evil emperor (often alluded to by critics as Charles V). The characters in Gargantua include those from Arthurian legends, and the story operates on multiple levels—contemporary, as well as classical and biblical.
Rabelais’s works include numerous digressions and stilting transitions from one scene to another. These digressions, and Rabelais’s narrative style as a whole, are meant to disconcert readers at critical points in the stories. Thus, what scholars and other readers have come to value in Gargantua and other of Rabelais’s writings is his ability to invent with unparalleled language and sensibility a comic criticism of historical and social events and issues of his day. For this reason, it is important to read Ra-belais’s works not as “modern” novels, but as burlesque portrayals of the 16th-century way of life, and not as formal philosophical criticisms of social vice, but as comic stories of human nature.
After publishing Pantagruel and Gargantua, Rabelais wandered through France, Italy, and Germany, spending time in the late 1530s and early 1540s teaching and practicing medicine. His opinions on religious and political matters caused him trouble with the authorities of various states, and he only narrowly avoided persecution.
In 1546 he published Tiers livre, which means “The Third Book.” It was completely unlike his two earlier works. The plot concerns the question of whether a man named Panurge should get married, but the story line is exceedingly thin. Through the events that happen to Panurge, Rabelais expresses his views not only of marriage, but also of war, money, and politics. However, because of Ra-belais’s subtle and ironic style, his views can be interpreted in many different ways, providing much fodder for current scholarship. Tiers livre was condemned by the Sorbonne and other authorities, who considered the work heretical. As a result, Rabelais fled France and moved to the German city of Metz. In 1552 he published The Fourth Book, which was also condemned by the Sorbonne.
Some years after Rabelais’s death, The Fifth Book was published. Although this work was credited to Rabelais, many historians question whether he actually wrote it.
Rabelais was one of the major literary figures of the 16th century, when such writers as Thomas More and Erasmus were producing brilliant work. He influenced such writers as montaigne, Hugo, and Flaubert. In a time of political uncertainty, increased by the Protestant Reformation, Rabelais stood as a literary giant, using wit and comedy in an attempt to express reasonable views in an unreasonable age.
English Versions of Works by Francois Rabelais
Complete Works of Francois Rabelais. Translated by Donald M. Frame. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
Five Books of The Lives, Heroic Deeds and Sayings of Gargantua and His Son Pantagruel. Whitefish, Mont.: Kessinger Publishing, 2004.
Gargantua and Pantagruel. Herts, U.K.: Wordsworth Editions, 2001.
Works about Francois Rabelais
Berry, Alice F. Charm of Catastrophe: A Study ofRa-belais’s Quart Livre. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001.
Carron, Jean-Claude. Francois Rabelais: Critical Assessments. Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995.
Frame, Donald M. Frangois Rabelais: A Study. New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1977.
Plattard, Jean. Life of Frangois Rabelais. Translated by L. D. Roache. London: Taylor and Francis, 1968.
