Gargantua and Pantagruel

>>8408673
Rabelais sounds interesting but he's very rarely mentioned these days so I'm not surprised that no one here (myself included) has actually read anything by him yet. I want to rectify this at some point, but there's so much other shit I want to read too that I have no idea when I'll get around to it.

can I just read the first two books and skip the rest?

>>8408720

I'd say Books 3 and 4 might even be better than 1 and 2. Every books is fairly distinct but there's a big difference between the first two and the last three. One of the things that bothered me about the first two books were these long lists (like: "Being of this age, his father ordained to have clothes made to him in his own livery, which was white and blue. To work then went the tailors, and with great expedition were those clothes made, cut, and sewed, according to the fashion that was then in request. I find by the ancient records or pancarts, to be seen in the chamber of accounts, or court of the exchequer at Montsoreau, that he was accoutred in manner as followeth. To make him every shirt of his were taken up nine hundred ells of Chasteleraud linen, and two hundred for the gussets, in manner of cushions, which they put under his armpits. His shirt was not gathered nor plaited, for the plaiting of shirts was not found out till the seamstresses (when the point of their needle (Besongner du cul, Englished The eye of the needle.) was broken) began to work and occupy with the tail. There were taken up for his doublet, eight hundred and thirteen ells of white satin, and for his points fifteen hundred and nine dogs' skins and a half. Then was it that men began to tie their breeches to their doublets, and not their doublets to their breeches: for it is against nature, as hath most amply been showed by Ockham upon the exponibles of Master Haultechaussade.
For his breeches were taken up eleven hundred and five ells and a third of white broadcloth. They were cut in the form of pillars, chamfered, channelled and pinked behind that they might not over-heat his reins: and were, within the panes, puffed out with the lining of as much blue damask as was needful: and remark, that he had very good leg-harness, proportionable to the rest of his stature.
For his codpiece were used sixteen ells and a quarter of the same cloth, and it was fashioned on the top like unto a triumphant arch, most gallantly fastened with two enamelled clasps, in each of which was set a great emerald, as big as an orange; for, as says Orpheus, lib. de lapidibus, and Plinius, libro ultimo, it hath an erective virtue and comfortative of the natural member. The exiture, outjecting or outstanding, of his codpiece was of the length of a yard, jagged and pinked, and withal bagging, and strutting out with the blue damask lining, after the manner of his breeches. But had you seen the fair embroidery of the small needlework purl, and the curiously interlaced knots, by the goldsmith's art set out and trimmed with rich diamonds, precious rubies, fine turquoises, costly emeralds, and Persian pearls" etc. etc. etc., on and on and on will passages like that go.

I haven't even read the fifth one yet, I just finished the fourth today. But I hear it's totally pseudepigraphical.

>>8408739
That's just part of the all-encompassing, encyclopedic aspect. Plus descriptions of clothes, liveries and so on were more popular or perhaps just standard at the time, like landscape/setting descriptions are now.
>(Besongner du cul, Englished The eye of the needle.)
What's that doing there? Some annotation? "Besongner du cul" is sex, literally "working one's ass"

>the fifth one yet, I just finished the fourth today. But I hear it's totally pseudepigraphical.
The 1997 Pléiade edition says it was apparently reconstituted from leftover scraps and drafts written by Rabelais while he was working on the fourth book, so that most of the material placed in the fifth wasn't supposed to follow that which he did use for the fourth, and it's hard to tell in what proportions it is Rabelais' writing or stitching from the editors. The fourth book itself takes from an earlier apocryphal travel sequel, and the first ones are based on smaller pamphlets which Rabelais may or may not have had a part in, so concerns of authenticity aren't all that relevant.

>>8408814

Yeah I suppose I'm just not used to it. The only medieval romance I've read is Roland and Le Morte Darthur but I don't remember any long lists like that in them.

What I like most about Rabelais is the rhetorical displays, which I read as satires on the futility of merely human knowledge and reasoning (which would fit with Rabelais' reformist sympathies).

I started reading him because he was such an influence on Sterne. I was still surprised by just how much of an influence he was. The significance of names, people with no noses, citing imaginary authorities, citing authorities through an intermediary with no attribution (for Rabelais, Erasmus' Adages, for Sterne, Burton's Anatomy), obscure bawdiness (though Rabelais has plenty of open bawdiness of course), etc. I still prefer Sterne. But maybe that's because I have no French.

File: 2.jpg (198KB, 564x1010px) Image search: [Google]

198KB, 564x1010px

lmao scatological humour dude XD

pic related is a much better Gargantua

>>8408673
Rabelais has fallen out of favor in the humanities, mostly because there's just not a lot of research behind him. There's a piece by Bakhtin that comes to mind, but he's kind of overshadowed by the likes of Quixote and the Elizabethan Stage as far as Ren. Lit. goes.

>>8408901

>Rabelais has fallen out of favor in the humanities, mostly because there's just not a lot of research behind him.

That's just not true man. There is tons of research and tons still being published. That piece by Bakhtin is considered among the most important works of 20th century literary criticism.

He is definitely less accessible than Shakespeare or Cervantes, though. Some of his jokes are about contemporary political/ecclesiastical figures hardly anybody would have heard of today, or about scandals long forgotten (like when the scholars of the Sarbonne posted reformist pamphlets throughout Paris to incite a riot on purpose to gain power by its recession: they were not themselves reformists).

But I think an important aspect of the book is its obscurity. Even in the renaissance a lot of the subtler stuff would have gone over reader's heads. Like all the Greek quotations, or that bit where Panurge speaks ten different languages.

I love Frere Jean's catch-phrase for something simple to do/solve/understand - "That's breviary stuff!"

>>8408901
? I'm not seeing a diminishing amount of research on Rabelais over the past couple decades