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Gargantua And Pantagruel
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Authorial Context: François Rabelais
Though the date of his birth is unknown, it is suggested that Rabelais was born in 1494 in the province of Touraine in France. Rabelais trained as a Franciscan mendicant—during which period he also studied law—and was ordained as a priest, but was heavily influenced by the humanists at Touraine. His interest in Greek, Latin, and the classics ignited his love for ancient learning, which was one of the principles of Renaissance humanism.
Since the Franciscans objected to his study of Greek, Rabelais joined the Benedictine order of monks, later switching to the study of medicine. While working as a physician, he started writing satirical pamphlets in his spare time, critiquing various aspects of social and religious life. His interest in humanism grew, and he famously wrote an admiring letter to the Dutch philosopher Erasmus.
In 1532, Rabelais published Pantagruel, a folklore-like novel inspired by the popular legend of Gargantua (from the Spanish word for throat: garganta). Condemned by censors, the book was a popular success, prompting Rabelais to publish its prequel Gargantua in 1534-1535. The other works of the pentalogy were greatly appreciated by readers, but Rabelais’s sharp satire—especially concerning the clergy—earned him disapproval as well. He often fled to Italy and Germany for short periods following the publication of his novels. After his patron, King Francis I, died in 1547, criticism against Rabelais grew and the sales of the fourth book were suspended in 1552. Rabelais died in Paris in 1553.
Historical Context: Rabelais’s France
Rabelais’s France was France in the heyday of the Renaissance. Though historians now agree that there is no neat break between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, it is true that by the 16th century in Europe, many writers and thinkers thought they were part of a cultural rebirth inspired by the classical age. This renewed interest in ancient authors led to the rise of “humanism”—a cultural and intellectual movement rooted in knowledge of the Greek and Latin classics, a commitment to discovery and inquiry, and a firm belief in human potential to achieve great things.
Major religious changes also swept through Europe, leading to a permanent rupture between the Roman Catholic Church and breakaway sects that became known as “Protestantism.” Protestantism, as the name suggests, originally began as a movement within the Catholic Church that protested against its corruption and luxury. Martin Luther, a former monk, became the figurehead of the movement. According to Luther, grace was the free gift of God that required no complex system of rewards, confession, merits, and intermediaries. Instead, sola scriptura—faith in, and compliance with, biblical scripture alone—was the basis of redemption.
The French crown remained firmly Catholic, taking a stand against what it regarded as Protestant “heresy.” In 1534, King Francis I passed edicts against those lampooning the Catholic Church. Even as Protestantism grew, King Henry II (1547-1559) intensified the harsh laws against heretics. Rabelais’s works reflect all these currents: his own syncretic humanism, his championing of the individual, his increasingly veiled critique of the Catholic Church and the Sorbonists, and his praise of monarchy in the various Introductions and Prologues of his books.
Critical Context: Censorship and Critical Reception
Upon its publication in 1532, Pantagruel was what contemporary readers would call an instant hit; it also became an instant thorn in the side of censors. The book’s bawdy humor, scatological references, grotesque imagery, and explicit jokes may have been familiar in folk narratives and performances, but were radical in the form of a novel.
Pantagruel was considered obscene not just by the Sorbonne, the department of theology at the University of Paris, but also by a certain class of readers. While its bawdy humor may seem more objectionable to contemporary audiences, what truly alarmed censors about Pantagruel was its veiled critique of the Catholic Church. However, because Rabelais enjoyed the patronage of the French kings Francis I and his son Henry II, he got away with censure rather than outright censorship in response to Pantagruel. It is important to note here that while King Francis I did initially support ecclesiastical reform, he wished for it to take place within the Catholic Church. Rabelais, too, may have mocked the Church and agreed with some of the ideas of Martin Luther, but he was not a Protestant himself.
Rabelais was keenly aware of the threat of the Sorbonne censor and the worsening of religious factionalism in France. When Gargantua was published in 1534-1535, religious riots were being suppressed in Paris. Rabelais had to flee to Italy in 1535 and, after the publication of the Third Book, to Germany in 1546. The fact that Rabelais waited nearly 16 years before publishing the third book could be related to the worsening political crisis in France. Catholic groups were increasingly afraid—as was the Crown—that Reformists could rise to power in France, and thus, censorship was growing worse. In 1562, less than a decade after his death, Rabelais’s pentalogy was put on the banned, heretical book list by the Council of Trent, an ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church that spawned the Counter-Reformation against Protestantism.
It was the same year the French Wars of Religion (1562-1598) snowballed, with French Catholics and Protestants locked in a civil war that killed millions from violence, starvation, and disease. During this period of tumult, Rabelais fell further from favor, although his works continued to be published outside of France. His influence on writers from Shakespeare to Jonathan Swift to Henry Fielding is undeniable, but it was only in the 20th century that scholarship began to focus on other aspects of Rabelais, apart from the entertaining and the bawdy. Literary critics discovered Rabelais’s experiments with language, his serious engagement with scripture, his knowledge of the classics, and the use of satire as social commentary. In contemporary scholarship, Rabelais is now recognized as one of the most important writers of the French Renaissance.
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