Sign-In
Cart
The Poet and the King: Jean de la Fontaine and His Century
Hardcover
Historical FiguresLiterary Figures
ISBN13: 9780268038779
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press
Published: Aug 31 2002
Pages: 542
Weight: 2.26
Height: 1.60 Width: 6.58 Depth: 9.42
Language: English
Awards: IndieFab awards
The Poet and the King, described by the New York Review of Books as the finest and most perceptive of all the innumerable accounts of La Fontaine, is being offered for the first time in an English translation. La Fontaine, whose works are still memorized by French schoolchildren, is regarded by Fumaroli, and countless others, as the greatest French lyric poet of the seventeenth century. La Fontaine is best known, however, for his fables and Contes.
Marc Fumaroli's grand study is almost as much about Louis XIV as it is about La Fontaine. He provides a detailed analysis of the absolutist politics and attempts by the king and his ministers to enforce an official cultural style. Fumaroli's work is a meditation on the plight of the artist under such a ruler during the imposition of a tyrannical, centralized political regime.
Of particular interest to Fumaroli is Nicolas Foucquet, whose fall from power is the central event of the book. Foucquet, La Fontaine's patron, was arrested and imprisoned by order of Louis XIV on false charges of embezzlement and treason. For La Fontaine, the arrest was a disaster. Foucquet had generously supported and protected La Fontaine, who remained loyal to him for decades, helping in his defense and writing pleas for pardon. Many of Foucquet's associates were arrested. Others, including La Fontaine, prudently left town.
During the reign of Louis XIV, the basic role of literature in the eyes of the court was that of an official propaganda machine. The royal cultural policy supported only tragedy and the heroic ode, and demanded works that praised the king. In the years that followed Foucquet's arrest, La Fontaine had to rely on support from groups unconnected with the government, including Jansenists, Protestants, and the libertine, homosexual circle of the Duc de Vendôme.
Fumaroli reads history with an eye on the modern world. His La Fontaine and his Foucquet, his world of free culture in opposition to state power, are models for the liberal vision of the possible role of culture in modern society. The Poet and the King offers not only a captivating history of one of France's greatest poets, but also carries the message that great literature and art can be created in spite of repressive cultural and political regimes.
Also in
Literary Figures
Up from the Depths: Herman Melville, Lewis Mumford, and Rediscovery in Dark Times
Sachs, Aaron
Hardcover
Hidden Hemingway: Inside the Ernest Hemingway Archives of Oak Park
Cirino, Mark
Elder
Vetch, Aaron
Hardcover
Go Deep and Take Plenty of Root: A Prairie-Norwegian Father, Rebellion in Minneapolis, Basement Zen, Growing Up, Growing Tender
Storlie, Erik Fraser
Paperback
Darkness Becomes Bright: On the Brief Life and Immortal Art of Edgar Allan Poe
Ogden, Emily
Hardcover
Travels with Charley in Search of America: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)
Steinbeck, John
Paperback
The Agatha Christie Cure: What Reading the Queen of Crime Taught Me about Life
Rentzenbrink, Cathy
Hardcover
Plot Twist: Life, Craft, and the Messy First Draft: A Memoir on Writing (Large Print Edition)
Coben, Harlan
Paperback
Eleven Days: The Fascinating True Account of Agatha Christie's Mysterious Disappearance
Thompson, Laura
Hardcover
Jane Austen's Bookshelf: A Rare Book Collector's Quest to Find the Women Writers Who Shaped a Legend
Romney, Rebecca
Paperback
Miss Greene's Secret: Based on the True Story of the Black Librarian Who Shaped the Morgan Library
Antona, Nicolas
Hardcover
The Lightning-Bug and the Lightning: Debunking the Myths of Mark Twain, in His Own Words
Dawidziak, Mark
Hardcover
The Village on the Edge of the World: Writing and Surviving in Ceausescu's Romania
Müller, Herta
Hardcover
Three by Annie Dillard: The Writing Life, an American Childhood, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Dillard, Annie
Paperback
Dark Renaissance: The Dangerous Times and Fatal Genius of Shakespeare's Greatest Rival
Greenblatt, Stephen
Hardcover
The War for Middle-Earth: J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis Confront the Gathering Storm, 1933-1945
Loconte, Joseph
Hardcover
Somewhere, a Boy and a Bear: A. A. Milne and the Creation of Winnie-The-Pooh
Brandreth, Gyles
Hardcover
The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary
Winchester, Simon
Paperback
String Theory: David Foster Wallace on Tennis: A Library of America Special Publication
Wallace, David Foster
Hardcover
Dark Renaissance: The Dangerous Times and Fatal Genius of Shakespeare's Greatest Rival
Greenblatt, Stephen
Paperback
The Apostle of Tennessee: The Indefatigable Life and Ministry of Father Aloysius Orengo
Pagetta, Joe
Paperback
From Typewriter to Takeoff: The Life of Journalist and Aviatrix Harriet Quimby
Tyler, Norman
Paperback
Everybody Behaves Badly: The True Story Behind Hemingway's Masterpiece the Sun Also Rises
Blume, Lesley M. M.
Paperback
The Making of Middle-Earth: The Worlds of Tolkien and the Lord of the Rings
Snyder, Christopher A.
Hardcover
Henry and June: From a Journal of Love: The Unexpurgated Diary (1931-1932) of Anais Nin
Nin, Anaïs
Paperback
Mon Cher Amour: The Love Letters of Albert Camus and Maria Casares, 1944-1959
Camus, Albert
Hardcover