The Poet's Odyssey
Joachim Du Bellay and the Antiquitez de Rome
Published on 22. November 1990
Book
Hardback
318 pages
978-0-19-815865-3 (ISBN)
Description
The Poet's Odyssey traces the artistic development of one of the major poets of the French Renaissance, Joachim Du Bellay (?1522-60), showing how he differed from his contemporaries (in particular his great rival Ronsard) and the importance of his move to Rome in 1553.
In this unique study of Du Bellay and his Antiquitez de Rome, Dr Tucker makes this complex sonnet sequence more accessible to the modern reader, highlighting its rich intertextual framework in Classical, neo-Latin and vernacular literature. He also redresses a critical imbalance. Du Bellay and his immediate contemporaries identified the Antiquitez, rather than the Regrets, as his major work. Tucker demonstrates its central importance within the poet's production, and further situates it within a whole tradition of reflection upon Rome and her destiny from Classical times onwards. The Antiquitez are also seen to represent the ultimate step in the development of a poetic style and sensibility in diametric opposition to Ronsard's. Finally, Dr Tucker also relates the collection to the literary and scholarly context of Du Bellay's Rome.
In this unique study of Du Bellay and his Antiquitez de Rome, Dr Tucker makes this complex sonnet sequence more accessible to the modern reader, highlighting its rich intertextual framework in Classical, neo-Latin and vernacular literature. He also redresses a critical imbalance. Du Bellay and his immediate contemporaries identified the Antiquitez, rather than the Regrets, as his major work. Tucker demonstrates its central importance within the poet's production, and further situates it within a whole tradition of reflection upon Rome and her destiny from Classical times onwards. The Antiquitez are also seen to represent the ultimate step in the development of a poetic style and sensibility in diametric opposition to Ronsard's. Finally, Dr Tucker also relates the collection to the literary and scholarly context of Du Bellay's Rome.
Reviews / Votes
`Tuckers scholarship is clearly up to the task ... The Antiquitez de Rome constitutes an impressive and moving meditation on the notion of transience ... Thanks to Tucker's study, we are now better placed to understand why his contemporaries thought so highly of them.'Times Higher Education Supplement `meticulous and erudite study'
Ann Moss, French Studies 'Dy Bellay's Antiquitez usually suffer in comparison with the more "modern" - and more easily accessible - Regrets. This study, with its exemplary analysis of sources and intertextual echoes, will do much to redress the balance.'
Forum for Modern Language Studies, Vol. XXVIII, No. 2, 1992 'This is an erudite and illuminating addition to the growing body of criticism devoted to Joachim Du Bellay'
Michael Heath, New Comparison 12 (Autumn 1991) `George Hugo Tucker has produced a valuable and informative book as a revised version of his PhD thesis. ...Tucker has read widely and the fruits of his research are impressive. ... I found his book informative, fascinating and a pleasure to read...'
Keith Cameron, Modern Language Review 'In critical method, this study is a dazzling and at times dizzying intertextual mise en abyme.'
Jerry C. Nash, University of Orleans, L'Esprit Createur, Fall 1992 'a valuable and informative book ... has read widely and the fruits of his research are impressive ... On every page he replaces Du Bellay in a literary tradition ... His commentary is supported by a wealth of footnotes which will provide the delight of the researcher avid for further information ... Tucker has provided us with a study which will play an important role in our understanding of Du Bellay. I found this book informative, fascinating and a pleasure to read and one where typographical errors are minimal.'
John O'Brien, University of Liverpool, Modern Language Review, Octobr 1992 'Impressive in its erudition ... This is a study which has much to offer to students of Du Bellay's Latin and neo-Latin heritage ... The author has brought a profusion of learning to his discussion of the sonnets of the Antiquitez, infusing them with an unexpectedly complex and varied cultural substratum.'
Floyd Gray, University of Michigan, Renaissance Quarterly 'studied in great and illuminating detail ... excitement involved in reading such an interesting text on so talented a poet ... To be able to understand and to explain why Bellay wrote as he did in his time and what that meant to his time and may mean to ours - well, that is a greater accomplishment. I wish to greet this book with delighted applause and say: Read it, if you have any interest in the relationship of poetry to philosophy and history, of the Renaissance to the past, of the Pleiade to the rest of French literature, of Renaissance concerns about the nature and value of art.'
Leonard R.N. Ashley, Bibliotheque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, Tome LIV, No. 1, 1992
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Oxford University Press
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 222 mm
Width: 145 mm
Thickness: 22 mm
Weight
584 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-19-815865-3 (9780198158653)
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Schweitzer Classification
Person
Content
Notes on bibliography; List of abbreviations; Introduction; A poetic odyssey: Parisian beginnings, departure, and homecoming; The quest for Rome, in Rome; Roman texts and contexts: Vitalis portrait gallery rediscovered; The end of all; Conclusion; Appendices; A. Du Bellay's age; B. Diogo Pires, Roberto Nobili, and Du Bellay; C. Recueils factices of Du Bellay, and their annotators Henri Estienne and Panjas; D. Buonamici, Castiglione, and Fabricius Roma; E. The poems of Calcagnini and other contents of a travelling-chest belonging to the Du Bellays; F. Summary of interrelated texts centring around Antiquitez, VIII; G. Reminiscences of Vitalis Roma Prisca (1553)/ De Roma antiqua (1554) in Du Bellay's Poemata (1558), 1. 2, Romae Descripteo (fos. 3v-6r); H. Lucan, his Commentator, and the Antiquitez de Rome; Du Soleil I'une & I'autre maison; J. Further annotations by Henri Estienne of the Antiquitez (2nd edn., 1558) in the recueil factice lyon, Bibl, Mun. Res. 321. 835]; K. Translations of the main medieval and renaissance Latin poetic texts quoted; Bibliography; Index