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Dufournetjean, et al., eds. Villon et ses kcteurs. Paris: Champion, 2005. Pp. 337.
This collection assembles the communications given at an international colloquium on François Villon (1431-C.1463) at the Bibliothèque Historique of Paris in December, 2002 (by generous hospitality of the director Jean Dérens). The articles alternate with creative writing about the poet, poetry which shows Villon's continuing afterlife and inspiration.
An introduction by Dufournet is followed by a perspicacious article, "Marot et Villon," penned by Jacqueline Cerquiglini-Toulet (Université de Genève). Clément Marot (1496-1544) is here characterized by proximity to as well as distance from Villon: proximity of themes (Paris, women, prison), but distance on die level of aesthetics. Villon aims at dispersion of ideas and sentiments (for example, he decomposes his je at die end of his Testament, 1461) ; Marot, in his turn, tries to "correct" and to define die Parisian's work when editing die manuscript (1533-42).
Jean Devaux wrote "La Male Fortune de Villon aux grands rhétoriqueurs" and describes these first readers of the poet. Fortune is a pessimistic theme in Villon (see the "Ballade de Fortune" and stanza CLXVI of the Testament) , a topic which can be found in die works of the Rhétoriqueurs : see "Le Chevalier deliberé" by Olivier de la Marche, as an example. Generally, though, these later poets advise humankind to meditate in order to defeat the whims of Fortune. Much scholarship on the theme of deadi should have been mentioned here; but non-European research on Villon is neglected in this volume (except for that of Robert Peckham and B. Sargent-Baur), even though this Villon colloquium specified an international approach on the book's cover.
A tonality quite different from the preceding articles is chosen by Jelle Koopmans (University of Amsterdam) : '"Mort, j'appelle de ta rigueur,' ou la première Renaissance française à l'écoute de François Villon." K. explains that the poet lives not just in form of manuscripts, but also in a world of song, voice, and strings (lute). While François has become famous for his Testament and the Lais (the latter barely mentioned in this collection!), the rondeau "Mort, j'appelle" Testament, 978-89) exists separately as a chanson and was inserted by the poet, possibly as an obscene afterthought - and certainly as a goodbye to...