their pedigree to the earliest ages of French literature, but
which bore an unfortunate likeness to the new-comers, was
proscribed. But for all that no language has ever had its destiny
influenced more powerfully and more beneficially by a small
literary clique than the language of France was influenced by the
example and disciples of that Ronsard whom for two centuries
it was the fashion to deride and decry.
In a sketch such as the present it is impossible to give a separate account of individual writers, the more important of whom will be found treated under their own names. The effort of the “Pléiade” proper was continued and shared by a considerable number of minor poets, The Ronsardists. some of them, as has been already noted, belonging to different groups and schools. Olivier de Magny (d. 1560) and Louise Labé (b. 1526) were poets and lovers, the lady deserving far the higher rank in literature. There is more depth of passion in the writings of “La Belle Cordière,” as this Lyonnese poetess was called, than in almost any of her contemporaries. Jacques Tahureau (1527–1555) scarcely deserves to be called a minor poet. There is less than the usual hyperbole in the contemporary comparison of him to Catullus, and he reminds an Englishman of the school represented nearly a century later by Carew, Randolph and Suckling. The title of a part of his poem—Mignardises amoureuses de l’admirée—is characteristic both of the style and of the time. Jean Doublet (c. 1528–c. 1580), Amadis Jamyn (c. 1530–1585), and Jean de la Taille (1540–1608) deserve mention at least as poets, but two other writers require a longer allusion. Guillaume de Salluste, seigneur du Bartas (1544–1590), Du Bartas. whom Sylvester’s translation, Milton’s imitation, and the copious citations of Southey’s Doctor, have made known if not familiar in England, was partly a disciple and partly a rival of Ronsard. His poem of Judith was eclipsed by his better-known La Divine Sepmaine or epic of the Creation. Du Bartas was a great user and abuser of the double compounds alluded to above, but his style possesses much stateliness, and has a peculiar solemn eloquence which he shared with the other French Calvinists, and which was derived from the study partly of Calvin and partly of the Bible. Théodore Agrippa d’Aubigné D’Aubigné. (1552–1630), like du Bartas, was a Calvinist. His genius was of a more varied character. He wrote sonnets and odes as became a Ronsardist, but his chief poetical work is the satirical poem of Les Tragiques, in which the author brands the factions, corruptions and persecutions of the time, and in which there are to be found alexandrines of a strength, vigour and original cadence hardly to be discovered elsewhere, save in Corneille and Victor Hugo. Towards the end of the century, Philippe Desportes (1546–1606) and Jean Bertaut (1552–1611), with much enfeebled strength, but with a certain grace, continue the Ronsardizing tradition. Among their contemporaries must be noticed Jean Passerat (1534–1602), a writer of much wit and vigour and rather resembling Marot than Ronsard, and Vauquelin de la Fresnaye (1536–1607), the author of a valuable Ars poëtica and of the first French satires which actually bear that title. Jean le Houx (fl. c. 1600) continued, rewrote or invented the vaux de vire, commonly known as the work of Olivier Basselin, and already alluded to, while a still lighter and more eccentric verse style was cultivated by Étienne Tabourot des Accords (1549–1590), whose epigrams and other pieces were collected under odd titles, Les Bigarrures, Les Touches, &c. A curious pair are Guy du Faur de Pibrac (1529–1584) and Pierre Mathieu (b. 1563), authors of moral quatrains, which were learnt by heart in the schools of the time, replacing the distichs of the grammarian Cato, which, translated into French, had served the same purpose in the middle ages.
The nephew of Desportes, Mathurin Regnier (1573–1613), marks the end, and at the same time perhaps the climax, of the poetry of the century. A descendant at once of the older Gallic spirit of Villon and Marot, in virtue of his consummate acuteness, terseness and wit, of the school of Ronsard Regnier. by his erudition, his command of language, and his scholarship, Regnier is perhaps the best representative of French poetry at the critical time when it had got together all its materials, had lost none of its native vigour and force, and had not yet submitted to the cramping and numbing rules and restrictions which the next century introduced. The satirical poems of Regnier, and especially the admirable epistle to Rapin, in which he denounces and rebuts the critical dogmas of Malherbe, are models of nervous strength, while some of the elegies and odes contain expression not easily to be surpassed of the softer feelings of affection and regret. No poet has had more influence on the revival of French poetry in the last century than Regnier, and he had imitators in his own time, the chief of whom was Courval-Sonnet (Thomas Sonnet, sieur de Courval) (1577–1635), author of satires of some value for the history of manners.
16th-Century Drama.—The change which dramatic poetry
underwent during the 16th century was at least as remarkable
as that undergone by poetry proper. The first half of the period
saw the end of the religious mysteries, the licence of which had
irritated both the parliament and the clergy. Louis XII., at
the beginning of the century, was far from discouraging the disorderly
but popular and powerful theatre in which the Confraternity
of the Passion, the clerks of the Bazoche, and the Enfans
sans souci enacted mysteries, moralities, soties and farces.
He made them, indeed, an instrument in his quarrel with the
papacy, just as Philippe le Bel had made use of the allegorical
poems of Jehan de Meung and his fellows. Under his patronage
were produced the chief works of Gringore or Gringoire (c. 1480–1547),
by far the most remarkable writer of this class of composition.
His Prince des sots and his Mystère de St Louis are among
the best of their kind. An enormous volume of composition of
this class was produced between 1500 and 1550. One morality
by itself, L’Homme juste et l’homme mondain, contains some
36,000 lines. But in 1548, when the Confraternity was formally
established at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, leave to play sacred
subjects was expressly refused it. Moralities and soties dragged
on under difficulties till the end of the century, and the farce,
which is immortal, continually affected comedy. But the effect
of the Renaissance was to sweep away all other vestiges of the
medieval drama, at least in the capital. An entirely new class
of subjects, entirely new modes of treatment, and a different
kind of performers were introduced. The change naturally
came from Italy. In the close relationship with that country
which France had during the early years of the century, Italian
translations of the classical masterpieces were easily imported.
Soon French translations were made afresh of the Electra, the
Hecuba, the Iphigenia in Aulis, and the French humanists
hastened to compose original tragedies on the classical model,
especially as exhibited in the Latin tragedian Seneca. It was
impossible that the “Pléiade” should not eagerly seize such an
opportunity of carrying out its principles, and one of its members,
Jodelle (1532–1573), devoting himself mainly to dramatic Regular tragedy
and
comedy.
composition, fashioned at once the first tragedy,
Cléopatre, and the first comedy, Eugène, thus setting
the example of the style of composition which for two
centuries and a half Frenchmen were to regard as the
highest effort of literary ambition. The amateur performance
of these dramas by Jodelle and his friends was followed by a
Bacchic procession after the manner of the ancients, which caused
a great deal of scandal, and was represented by both Catholics
and Protestants as a pagan orgy. The Cléopâtre is remarkable
as being the first French tragedy, nor is it destitute of merit.
It is curious that in this first instance the curt antithetic
στιχομυθία, which was so long characteristic of French plays and
plays imitated from them, and which Butler ridicules in his
Dialogue of Cat and Puss, already appears. There appears also
the grandiose and smooth but stilted declamation which came
rather from the imitation of Seneca than of Sophocles, and the
tradition of which was never to be lost. Cléopâtre was followed
by Didon, which, unlike its predecessor, is entirely in alexandrines,
and observes the regular alternation of masculine and feminine
rhymes. Jodelle was followed by Jacques Grévin (1540?–1570)
with a Mort de César, which shows an improvement in tragic art,
and two still better comedies, Les Ébahis and La Trésorière by
Jean de la Taille (1540–1608), who made still further progress
