French literature

Middle Ages

Middle Ages

1 October 2020

XXth century

1 October 2020

XIXth century

1 October 2020

XVIIIth century

1 October 2020

XVIIth Century

31 March 2021

Renaissance

1 October 2020

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages are long. They stretch from the end of the Roman Empire (around 5th century) until the fall of Constantinople or the discovery of America by the West in 1492. In other words, a thousand years.

France was essentially rural. The life was regulated by the works flowing from the seasons.

While our imaginations often see this period as a sad and unhappy era for mankind, there were actually many periods of radiance in the Middle Ages. In particular from the 11th to the 13th century, when the Romanesque and Gothic churches were born.

Voir

But life in the Middle Ages was constantly overshadowed by an infernal trio: war, famine, and plague. The population of a city could be reduced by half within ten years—only to recover rapidly afterward. More than in any other era, medieval men and women lived on a knife-edge, forever close to the brink of death.

And yet, although the Middle Ages may seem distant, they left a lasting imprint on Western culture. It was during this time that a particular idea of love took shape—*love-passion*—which would endure and nourish the Western imagination to this day: a love fraught with obstacles, a long-delayed embrace, a desire proved through trials of courage.

 

The french language in the Middle Ages

Although it has been shaped by many influences over time, French is directly descended from Latin. However, after the fall of the Roman Empire and throughout the Middle Ages, the Vulgar Latin spoken by the people of France gradually evolved into a language that had moved far away from classical Latin. As early as 813, at a synod held in Tours, the bishops raised the issue: sermons should be delivered in the language of the common people, not in Latin.

At this time, the printing press did not yet exist. Books were rare, reserved mainly for sacred use, and paper was extremely expensive. Language was, above all, oral—marked by strong regional variation.

As a result, medieval literature was largely meant to be recited, sung, or performed. Hence the rise of the troubadours and the staging of mystery plays.

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Medieval literature in France : a story of repression

Unlike in Anglo-Saxon countries, as well as Germany, Spain, and Italy, France has long viewed the Middle Ages as a transitional, obscure, and burdensome period. Is medieval literature still part of our cultural heritage? Who today still knows that the quest for the Holy Grail was invented by Chrétien de Troyes and Robert de Boron? Or that the first version of the legend of Tristan and Iseult was written in French?

Psychoanalysts remind us that questioning one’s origins often leads to fantasies—or shame. Old French emerged from a spoken, worn-down, provincial, simplified, dialectal form of Latin… an illegitimate offspring of classical Latin, an impure, vulgar creature—a Jacquouille, so to speak, to be hidden away.

A destiny beyond borders

Although the Middle Ages briefly fascinated French Romantic writers of the 1830s (Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo, Gérard de Nerval), medieval French literature had a far greater impact abroad. Chrétien de Troyes’s Perceval, or The Story of the Grail was adapted into German by Wolfram von Eschenbach in the early 13th century and would later inspire Richard Wagner’s Parsifal—and even Monty Python and the Holy Grail! In England, Chaucer translated Le Roman de la Rose, which was, alongside Dante’s Divine Comedy, one of the best-selling works of medieval Europe. The legend of Tristan and Isolde (whose precise origins remain uncertain but whose earliest written forms are in French) became the archetype of passionate love throughout 19th-century Europe, notably in Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde.

A secular burial

The distancing from the medieval period began very early. In the 1540s, Montaigne’s father introduced his son directly to the Latin classics, bypassing medieval romances entirely:

“Of Lancelot of the Lake, Amadis, Huon of Bordeaux, and all that heap of books that children amuse themselves with, I did not even know the names.” (Essays, I, XXVII, translated by Donald Frame, 1958.)

This burial process would continue for centuries.

The humanist scholars of the 16th century devoted themselves to correcting what they saw as the corruptions undergone by spoken Latin over time (see box). A century later, Racine chose not to draw his tragic subjects from Arthurian legends or chansons de geste, but from Greek and Roman history and literature: Huon de Bordeaux or The Story of the Grail might be picturesque, but they were not serious. Unsurprisingly, the Enlightenment would largely reject a period it viewed as irrational and indifferent to the notion of progress.

Romanticism and Romanistik

At the beginning of the 19th century, in the wake of the great Napoleonic upheaval, European nations sought to assert their cultural identity. German Romantics (Herder, Schiller, and others) became convinced that the soul of a people was rooted in archaic traditions, pointing back to a more “authentic,” medieval world. Among the French, this medieval fascination often took the form of a fashion trend that could slip into rather kitschy bric-a-brac, especially in theatre (for instance, Dumas’s La Tour de Nesle).

At the same time, 19th-century German philologists made major advances in the study of medieval Romance languages (Romanistik), correcting many of the Romantic era’s idealised visions of a fantasised original world. France followed this scholarly movement by establishing a chair in medieval French language and literature at the Collège de France in 1853. Gaston Paris and Joseph Bédier, in particular, brought new momentum to the study of medieval French literature—a movement carried forward by the great medievalists of the 20th century.

The Middle Ages from century to century

Literature:

Notable kings and historical events:

Architecture:

Emergence and flourishing of Romanesque churches and monasteries. More than 2,600 Romanesque churches (11th–12th centuries) are still standing in France today. Numerous abbeys are founded, such as Bec-Hellouin in Normandy (likely home of the author of The Song of William). Construction begins on Cluny III Abbey, which would remain the largest religious building in Christendom for five centuries.

Literature:

    • William IX of Aquitaine (1071–1126), grandfather of Eleanor of Aquitaine, is considered the first known troubadour in the Occitan language. The 12th century was the golden age of courtly love as celebrated by the troubadours (in Occitan) and later by the trouvères (in Old French or langue d’oïl).
    • The legend of Tristan and Iseult was written by Béroul (between 1160 and 1190) and Thomas of Britain (between 1170 and 1180). Eilhart von Oberge wrote a Middle High German version inspired by Béroul’s text between 1170 and 1190.
    • Numerous chansons de geste were written during this century.
    • Chrétien de Troyes developed the Arthurian legend into a fully-fledged literary universe between 1170 and 1190, notably in:
      • Lancelot, or The Knight of the Cart
      • Yvain, or The Knight of the Lion
      • Perceval, or The Story of the Grail
      •  
    • Early branches of Reynard the Fox (Le Roman de Renart) appear around 1174.
    • Aristotle’s works were translated from Arabic manuscripts in Spain (Toledo) and Italy.

Notable kings and historical events:

    • Eleanor of Aquitaine (1122–1204), Queen of France and later Queen of England.
    • Philippe Auguste (Philip II, 1165–1180/1223), the first monarch officially styled King of France (rather than King of the Franks).
    • The Crusader States developed after the First Crusade (1095). In 1187, Saladin retook Jerusalem from the Crusaders.

Architecture:

Literature:

    • Le Roman de la Rose, begun by Guillaume de Lorris (c. 1230) and continued by Jean de Meun (c. 1265).
    • Geoffroy de Villehardouin wrote The Conquest of Constantinople (1207–1213), an account of the failed Fourth Crusade.
    • Marco Polo recounted his extraordinary travels to China in a work written in French, Le Livre des Merveilles (The Book of Marvels, 1298).
    • New branches of Reynard the Fox developed further.
    • In Latin, Thomas Aquinas‘s Summa Theologica (completed in 1274) marked the pinnacle of Scholasticism, seeking to synthesize Aristotelian philosophy (rediscovered a century earlier through Arabic translations) with Christian theology.

Notable kings and historical events:

    • Louis IX, known as Saint Louis (1214–1226/1270).
    • Philip IV, known as Philip the Fair (1268–1285/1314).
    • The Crusades entered a period of decline, leading to the fall of the last Latin stronghold in the East after the capture of Acre in 1291.

Architecture:

High Gothic period: churches became increasingly tall and filled with light. The Sainte-Chapelle was completed in 1248, and this architectural trend continued into the 14th century.

Literature:

    • Development of popular religious theatre and comic theatre, often performed in a circular space where the audience took part (see Henri Rey-Flaud, Le Cercle magique).
    • Jean Froissart writes his Chronicles, a historical account of a century shaken by war.
    • Guillaume de Machaut becomes the most significant poet and composer of the century.
    • Eustache Deschamps, poet and author of the first treatise on French poetry (Art de dictier, 1392), defines poetry as “music of the mouth uttering words in verse.”

Notable kings and historical events:

    • Philip IV, known as Philip the Fair (1268–1285/1314), dissolves the Order of the Knights Templar.
    • Charles V, known as Charles the Wise (1338–1364/1380), reigns as a patron of the arts.
    • Charles VI, known as Charles the Mad (1368–1380/1422), becomes king but later succumbs to mental illness.
    • Edward III of England (1312–1327/1377) claims the French throne.
    • France is severely weakened by the Hundred Years’ War; by 1360, England occupies nearly one-third of French territory.
    • Both towns and countryside are devastated by roaming mercenary bands known as grandes compagnies.
    • The Western Schism divides Christendom, with two popes ruling simultaneously.
    • The Black Death of 1348 kills an estimated one-third of Europe’s population.

Architecture:

The 14th century is marked by severe economic, health, agricultural, and political crises, leading to fewer major building projects. However, Gothic architecture continues to evolve toward greater verticality and simplicity—for example, with the removal of capitals to streamline the profile of columns.

Literature:

    • Christine de Pizan, often regarded as France’s first professional woman writer, produces a rich body of work, notably in defence of women.
    • François Villon, poet and outlaw, distinguishes himself with a strikingly personal style that blends bawdy humour with a deep obsession with death.
    • Dante’s Divine Comedy is published in French for the first time in 1472.
    • Gutenberg revolutionises text reproduction with the invention of movable type in the 1450s.

Notable kings and historical events:

    • Joan of Arc leads Charles VII to his coronation in 1429, marking a decisive turning point in the Hundred Years’ War. The English are permanently expelled from France after 1453.
    • Louis XI (1423–1461/1483) strengthens and centralises royal authority over the kingdom.
    • Charles VIII (1470–1483/1498) launches a military campaign in Italy in 1494, initiating numerous conflicts but also fostering cultural exchanges that will intensify in the following century.

Architecture:

Gothic architecture remains dominant, particularly in its flamboyant phase, as seen in buildings such as Notre-Dame de Kernascléden and Évreux Cathedral. Renewed influences from Italy in the 16th century pave the way for Renaissance styles, eventually rendering Gothic architecture obsolete.

Who writes what ?

Enigmatic authors

While some medieval authors are clearly identified (such as Bernard de Ventadour in the 12th century or Christine de Pizan in the 15th), in many cases we have little more than a name—and sometimes even that is uncertain. Moreover, the modern concept of the author did not exist in the same sense during the Middle Ages. This is evident in the final line of The Song of Roland:

Ci falt la geste que Turoldus declinet
(“Here ends the tale that Turold… ‘declinet’”)

We know nothing more about this Turold. Nor is the word declinet unequivocal—should it be understood as set down? transmitted? composed? recited? This kind of ambiguity is frequent in medieval texts, particularly in chansons de geste, parts of Le Roman de Renart (Reynard the Fox), and versions of the legend of Tristan and Iseult. Is the named individual the creator of the tale or merely its transmitter? The question is often difficult to answer—and remains fertile ground for scholarly debate !

Arboriform literature

In the Middle Ages, literary works did not emerge from nowhere. They branched from a shared trunk. For instance, chansons de geste were grouped into cycles centred around a legendary or historical figure such as Charlemagne, tracing his own story and then branching out into those of his ancestors, descendants, cousins, and companions. Likewise, the stories of the Grail cycle were conceived as a continuation and expansion of Chrétien de Troyes’s Arthurian romances.

Reynard the Fox, meanwhile, functions as a single text composed of multiple branches. The full “tree” was built by around 29 different authors over some eighty years of writing, which sometimes results in overlapping episodes or outright contradictions between branches.

Verse and prose

As in Greek and Latin literature, French medieval literature began in verse, not prose. Works were intended to be read aloud, recited, or sung, and verse likely served a mnemonic purpose. Thus, chansons de geste, Chrétien de Troyes’s romances, Reynard the Fox, The Romance of the Rose, and mystery plays such as those by Arnoul Gréban were all written in verse.

Prose emerged more broadly from the 13th century onward. Unlike verse, which was often associated with poetry, song, or fictional narrative, prose laid claim to truth. Prose was used in works such as the Grail cycle (which integrates Arthurian legend with elements of the Gospels), historical chronicles like those of Froissart or Villehardouin, or certain texts by Christine de Pizan. Verse was linked to fiction and performance; prose aimed at testimony and reliability.

Chansons de geste: knights on a mission

What is a chanson de geste? Literally a “song of deeds,” it recounts heroic exploits in epic poetic form. The earliest works of this genre appeared in the late 11th century, and most were written between the 12th and 13th centuries, at the height of the Crusades and the expansion of the Latin states in the East. Their authors are usually unknown.

For practical purposes, chansons de geste are traditionally grouped into three cycles (or gestes).

  • The Cycle of the King centres on Charlemagne.
  • The Cycle of Garin de Monglane revolves around William of Orange, a partly fictionalised character inspired by a cousin of Charlemagne.
  • These two cycles largely depict wars against the Saracens.
  • The Cycle of Doon of Mainz, however, focuses more on rebellious vassals rising against their lords.

Between the events described (around the year 800) and the writing of the songs, roughly 400 years passed without written record. How did these narratives survive? Where did they originate? The answer remains uncertain. Scholars have proposed various hypotheses, but we still do not know whether the stories emerged from a long-standing oral tradition or were initially crafted by individual authors.

“Great pain he has, and trouble in his head,
His temples burst when he the horn sounded;
But he would know if Charles will come to them,
Takes the olifant, and feebly sounds again.
That Emperour stood still and listened then:
‘My lords,’ said he, ‘Right evilly we fare!
This day Rollanz, my nephew shall be dead:
I hear his horn, with scarcely any breath.’ ”

La chanson de Roland (trans. C. K. Scott Moncrieff)

Transforming history into legend

Most chansons de geste contain a core of historical reality that has been transformed into legend. Take The Song of Roland, for example: Charlemagne’s troops did indeed fight at Roncesvalles in 778. But it is rather unlikely that Charlemagne was two hundred years old, as the poem implies, or that 300,000 Saracen warriors were present on the battlefield (even supposing they were Saracens at all!).

Another example: the real battles fought by William of Gellone against Muslim forces in Septimania in the 790s are magnified in the legendary Battle of Aliscans (in the chanson de geste of the same name), which is first lost and then won by William of Orange—also called William Shortnose, William the Horned, or Fierabras.

“Monjoie!”: heroic exaltation

The figure of the knight is central to the chanson de geste. But this is not the wandering knight of Arthurian legend. Here, the knight is a man on a mission. He fights alongside his companions against the two great enemies of feudal Christianity: infidels and traitors (felons).

His duty is simple and brutal. He is not expected to seek negotiation or compromise. Above all, he must be strong and courageous—strike with the sword, thrust with the lance, break bones—destroy his opponent. He must also uphold honour and selflessness, two values that would remain fundamental to the nobility for centuries. Violent death is part of a knight’s destiny: he must die “en grant bataille a freit acer” (“in great battle by cold steel”).

La quinte estampie réale (13th century)

Excerpt from a musical piece from Ms 844, known as the “Chansonnier du roi,” anonymous composer. Performed by the Aëlis ensemble, 2015.

The Saracens

Since the Umayyad invasion in the 8th century (Battle of Poitiers, 732) and subsequent incursions into Provence (which continued into the 12th century), Muslims were perceived as the primary enemy. The succession of Crusades (late 11th to 13th century) further intensified this confrontation.

The world of the chansons de geste offers nothing like intercultural dialogue or the relativism found later in works such as Persian Letters. Entirely indifferent to the real customs, traditions, or beliefs of the Moors, these texts ascribe to them a bizarre polytheism (Muhammad, Tervagan, Cahu, Sorape, etc.), which likely reflects not just ignorance but also a deeper anxiety within the young Christian West—haunted by the persistence of pagan practices among its own rural populations.

Fin’amor: the exaltation of the troubadours

While chansons de geste flourished in the langue d’oïl, a new poetic form emerged in the langue d’oc of southern France in the early 12th century. In stark contrast to the brutality of war epics, it celebrated a respectful, passionate love entirely devoted to itself: fin’amor (perfect love).

The authors of these poems were troubadours (not to be confused with jongleurs, who performed and sang them publicly). These poets—men and women alike (there were 23 known trobairitz)—were generally of noble birth. They created a genre that would spread to northern France (where its practitioners were called trouvères), and later to Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Germany (as the Minnesänger).

Fin’amor (later termed “courtly love” by Gaston Paris) had nothing to do with marriage or founding a household; on the contrary, it was almost always adulterous and socially transgressive. The lovers sacrificed everything to the force of desire, yet managed to perpetually delay their union. Courtly love unfolded largely in an intimate, often epistolary mode, marked by distances, obstacles, and long separations. It caused hearts to race—but also to sigh and anguish. Life itself, and even language, seemed unequal to desire, as the trobairitz Clara d’Anduza suggests.

Ami, j’éprouve tant de colère et de désespoir de ne pas vous voir que lorsque je pense chanter, je me plains et je soupire parce que je ne puis faire avec mes couplets ce que mon cœur voudrait accomplir.

“As long as I live” (13th century)

Rondeau by the troubadour Adam de la Halle (c. 1240-1300), performed by the musical ensemble Tenet.

“God! When the cry goes up: “Forward!”…

What keeps me strong as I wait
Is that I hold his pledge of faith.
And when a gentle breeze blows
From that sweet land
Where dwells the one I long for,
Gladly I turn my face that way.
And then it seems to me I feel him
Beneath my grey mantle.

God! When the cry goes up: “Forward!”…

What I regret most of all
Is not having seen him leave.
The shirt he wore,
He sent it to me to kiss.
At night, when love for him overwhelms me,
I lay it beside me in bed,
All night long against my bare flesh,
To ease my pain.”

 

Guiot de Dijon

A demanding love

How does courtly love work? First, the lover humbly asks the lady to accept his devotion. Submissive to her will, he must undergo long trials before the long-awaited union.

Frequently, the lover departs for war (often to the Holy Land, as this is the age of the Crusades) to prove his worth, win her favour, and seduce her. In a tragic paradox, the lady both desires and fears such trials, as they endanger the man she loves (see the excerpt by Guiot de Dijon).

Time plays a crucial role. The lady keeps her lover waiting, giving evasive answers to his pleas, aware that love often fades once fulfilled. What becomes of desire when there is nothing left to desire? Are not beginnings the sweetest moments? By withholding too much, she also tests the sincerity and endurance of her lover’s feelings.

To this end, fin’amor introduced a final ordeal: the assag. The lover is allowed to join the lady in bed, to embrace, kiss, and caress her—but must go no further. If he resists base instinct, he proves the nobility of a love freed from mere physical appetite.

Breton sources of inspiration

The forest of Arthurian tales

Arthur, the Round Table, the Holy Grail—where does this legend, still alive today in works like Indiana Jones or Alexandre Astier’s Kaamelott, come from?

In the mid-12th century, Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote a Latin History of the Kings of Britain, in which King Arthur and the magician Merlin play key roles. Wace adapted it into Anglo-Norman as Le Roman de Brut, expanding Arthur’s importance. Yet this remained more historiography than literature.

It was Chrétien de Troyes (around 1180—at the same time Notre-Dame de Paris was beginning to rise) who first transformed the legend into a fully literary universe. Crucially, he introduced the quest for the Grail—although he never finished his final tale, leaving the meaning of the Grail unexplained.

Later, Robert de Boron gave the Grail a sacred function, describing it as the cup that caught Christ’s blood. Around 1220–1230, an immense Grail Cycle gathered together Arthurian legends in five substantial prose romances with a distinctly Christian orientation: The History of the Holy Grail, Merlin, Lancelot, The Quest for the Holy Grail, The Death of King Arthur.

What is Anglo-Norman?

Some of the foundational texts of the “Matter of Britain” were written in Anglo-Norman, such as Béroul’s Tristan and Iseult and Wace’s Roman de Brut.

Anglo-Norman is simply the variety of French brought to England after William of Normandy’s conquest in 1066. Also called Insular French, it remained a major literary language in Britain until the 14th century. Middle English itself arose partly from the fusion of this Insular French with the local vernacular, which explains why so many English words today derive from French.

It should be noted that in the Middle Ages, several languages were spoken in what is now France, all derived from Latin. North of the Loire, the langue d’oïl included Francien, Picard, and Anglo-Norman; in the south, the langue d’oc was spoken—the ancestor of modern Occitan.

Chrétien de Troyes: the quest of the knight-errant

Within this forest of diverse tales, the work of Chrétien de Troyes occupies a special place. Unlike his predecessors, he does not claim any historical grounding for his narratives. Nor are his heroes’ adventures reduced to allegory or a loose compilation of episodes. With a distinctive tone and style, Chrétien de Troyes follows a character through pivotal moments in which everything may be decided without his awareness. These narratives are often considered the birth of the Western novel.

Chrétien de Troyes also created the figure of the knight-errant. Unlike the warriors of the chansons de geste, the knight-errant is a solitary figure. He roams in search of adventures—trusting that providence will offer him an opportunity to prove his worth. His world remains permeated by the chivalric code and by fin’amor. As he wanders, he defends women from villains and submits to their will—even if it means climbing into a dishonourable cart.

This atmosphere of courtly devotion is sometimes tempered by a touch of irony when the heroes must face life after conquest. After winning his beloved in glorious combat, Perceval cannot resist returning to battle, despite his lady’s pleas. In contrast, Erec grows too domestic for Enide’s taste, and she urges him back into adventure (Erec and Enide). Courtly love, it seems, does not thrive in everyday life!

Tristan and Iseult: a tragic love story

In the second half of the 12th century, Béroul recorded a legend, probably of Celtic origin: the story of Tristan and Iseult. In brief: while escorting Princess Iseult, whose hand he is to request on behalf of King Mark, Tristan mistakenly drinks a love potion that binds him to her in overwhelming passion. Predictably, this illicit love provokes hostility. The lovers are separated. Tristan is ambushed and gravely wounded. Only Iseult can heal him. Believing himself abandoned, he dies uttering her name—just as she arrives and collapses in his arms.

A narrative so closely uniting absurdity, passion, and death naturally captivated 19th-century Romantics. In the Middle Ages, the legend permeated the collective imagination. Is true love fatally destined to remain unfulfilled? Is it an expression of freedom—or a kind of enslavement, as the potion suggests?

In music, it was Wagner who most powerfully conveyed the tragedy of a love that cannot be fulfilled in life, notably through the famous Tristan chord, a haunting motif that runs throughout Tristan und Isolde (1865).

Satire and protest

Alongside courtly literature, the Middle Ages also produced a far more critical and mischievous current—its ironic mirror image. This includes the branches of Le Roman de Renart (Reynard the Fox), the fabliaux, and Le Roman de la Rose.

Reynard the Fox : dupes and tricksters

Is humanity divided between believers and unbelievers? Between good and evil? Master and servant? For the authors of Reynard the Fox, the world is instead made up of dupes and tricksters—roles that shift depending on circumstance. Reynard is a clever fox who exploits the naivety of his adversaries, but he does not always triumph. Is he good or evil? The answer is ambiguous—and his enemies are no better than he is. The work forms a sweeping satire of human weaknesses and baseness, but perhaps also pays tribute to human resilience and adaptability.

Flourishing from the late 12th to the 13th century, the various branches of Reynard the Fox were written by several mostly anonymous authors. Later continuations, such as Rutebeuf’s Renart le Bestourné or Renart le Contrefait, shifted increasingly toward direct political satire and concentrated all vices in the character of Renart.

Prisons

“To show you Nature’s astonishing power, I can offer more than one example.
Take the little bird from the leafy woods: once it’s caught and put in a cage—pampered, delicately fed—it may seem to sing gaily there all its life, yet it longs for the green thicket where it was born, and for the branches it loves. Nothing you give it will stop it scheming to win back its freedom: it stamps on its feed in the heat of that desire, and paces its cage in anguish, searching for some crack or chink through which it might slip and fly away.

So it is with women—ladies or maidens, whatever their station: by nature they seek the paths that could make them free. The same with a man who takes holy orders and later repents: he’s so tormented by the urge to recover the liberty he’s lost that he almost hangs himself in despair. He rages and laments, eaten up by the desire to be free again…”

 

Le Roman de la Rose

The Romance of the Rose: love and perversion

By the 13th century, life had become more urban, and the great Gothic cathedrals were nearing completion. Yet the Crusades had stalled; the West (through figures like Marco Polo) realised it was not alone, and that universal conversion would not come easily. In theology, scholars struggled to reconcile Aristotle’s philosophy with Christian doctrine. And despite technical progress, agriculture could no longer adequately feed the growing population. A tremor of doubt ran through the kingdom of France.

A synthesis and masterpiece of the medieval age, Le Roman de la Rose is both a poem of courtly love and a corrosive expression of these uncertainties.

What is love? How does one love? These are the questions the text seeks to explore. The first part, written by Guillaume de Lorris around 1230, unfolds as an initiatory journey aligned with the courtly ideal—marked by love at first sight, trials, submission, patience, and a refined sense of elegance. The second part, written by Jean de Meun around 1270, is far more provocative. The author overturns the ideals of fin’amor and, more broadly, attacks all established institutions. No one is spared: the Church, the clergy, nobles, peasants, men, women. What becomes of love amidst this universal mockery? Merely a scam—a sexual impulse that dares not speak its name. Death urges us to enjoy ourselves and reproduce; everything else is deception and literature.

What an astonishing Middle Ages indeed!

Major writers of the Middle Ages

Chrétien de Troyes

Christine de Pizan

François Villon