François Rabelais

c. 1494
Chinon, France
1553
Chinon, France?

French humanist, physician, and prose satirist

"It is quite a common and vulgar thing among humans to understand, foresee, know and predict the troubles of others. But oh what a rare thing it is to predict, know, foresee and understand one's own troubles."

François Rabelais as quoted in Bartlett's Quotations. [Online] Available http://www.bartleby.com/66/45/45745.html, April 5, 2002.

The French humanist, physician, and author François Rabelais is acclaimed as a comic genius. He published several works, but he is best known for Gargantua and Pantagruel.

Facts of early life unknown

Unfortunately, there are large gaps in information about Rabelais's life. Some records suggest he was born in 1483, but it is widely believed the true date was closer to 1494. Rabelais was the son of a well-established lawyer in the town of Chinon, in the province of Touraine, France. He may have had a scholastic education, which would explain his dislike for overly learned, self-important scholars, an opinion he expressed in his writings. (Scholasticism was the dominant philosophical movement within the Catholic Church from the ninth to the seventeenth centuries. Scholastic thinkers sought to combine the ideas of ancient Greek philosophers with Christian teachings.) It is possible that as early as 1510 or 1511 Rabelais was a novice (a person given probationary admittance into a religious community) at the nearby Franciscan monastery (a religious community founded by Saint Francis of Assisi) of La Baumette, where he would have received the traditional education in church Latin and scholasticism.

The first documentary evidence of Rabelais's life is a letter he wrote in 1521, after he had entered the Franciscan order and joined a group of humanist scholars. (Humanists were members of a literary and intellectual movement dedicated to the study of classical languages and culture, which started in Italy in the mid-1300s. Humanism is credited with initiating the Renaissance.) Rabelais was one of a growing number of European scholars who could read Greek. This ability was significant because texts studied by the scholastics were Latin translations of works originally written in Greek. Sixteenth-century humanists such as the Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus (1466–1536; see entry) were discovering numerous errors in Latin versions of many works, especially the New Testament (second part of the Bible, the Christian holy book). In the first of a series of conflicts between Rabelais and the faculty of theology (professors of religion) at the University of Paris, the Greek and Latin texts of Rabelais and his circle were seized in 1523. At that time the University of Paris was the center of Catholic learning in Europe, and the theology faculty decided which books could be read by scholars and students alike. Although the faculty eventually returned Rabelais's books, Rabelais quickly moved to the less restrictive Benedictine order (monastic communities following the rule of Saint Benedict). He entered the service of Abbot (head of the monastery) Geoffroy d'Estissac, later bishop of Maillezais, who would remain an important patron, or financial supporter of Rabelais.

In 1527 Rabelais left the Benedictine order and became a priest. At some point in the next three years he must have spent considerable time studying medicine, perhaps at the University of Paris. In 1530 he registered at Montpellier University and received a bachelor of medicine degree six weeks later. While he practiced medicine periodically and even performed a dissection of, or cutting apart, a body for the purposes of medical observation in 1537, Rabelais distinguished himself in the profession through his linguistic skills. Medical school course work relied heavily on Latin translations of works by the early Greek medical writers Hippocrates (460–370 b.c.) and Galen (a.d. 129–c. 199). With his knowledge of Greek, Rabelais produced editions of these ancient medical texts that were both accurate and free of excessive commentary. He followed the lead of Erasmus and the French humanist Guillaume Budé (1467–1540), who worked with both secular (nonreligious) and sacred texts. In 1531 Rabelais lectured on Hippocrates at Montpellier, citing the original Greek text. The following year he settled in Lyons as a physician at the Hôtel-Dieu (a hospital) and published a new edition of Hippocrates's Aphorism.

Publishes Gargantua and Pantagruel

In 1531 Rabelais also began a series of sham, or fake, almanacs titled Pantagrueline Prognosticato, which he mockingly dedicated to "fools and idle dreamers." An almanac was a publication that gave a forecast of events for the coming year on the basis of astrology, a science devoted to predicting the future according to the positions of the stars and planets. Soon after beginning the almanacs Rabelais attached himself to one of his most important patrons, Cardinal Jean du Belay (c.1492–1560), the bishop of Paris. Despite the support of du Bellay, Rabelais would spend the remainder of his life on the margins of political and financial stability. Having identified with religious and intellectual reformers, he constantly came under suspicion from the faculty of theology at the University of Paris and the ever-changing French monarchy (government headed by a single ruler, such as a king or queen).

In 1534 Rabelais accompanied du Bullay to Rome as his personal physician. Upon returning to France, Rabelais published Gargantua, the history and adventures of the giant Pantagruel. Gargantua was the first part (book) of the novel Gargantua and Pantagruel. For years Rabelais had neglected his duties as a monk (one who lives in or is a member of a monastery) without the permission of the church, and on a second trip to Rome he sought and received absolution, or forgiveness, for deserting his order. No longer a monk, Rabelais attained his advanced medical degree from Montpellier in 1537. He then supported himself through his medical practice, support from patrons, and the modest income he received from his popular writings. In 1543 Gargantua and Pantagruel was again condemned by the Paris faculty of theology, but two years later Rabelais received permission from the king to publish more tales of Pantagruel. A third installment appeared the following year. After a third and final trip to Rome, Rabelais was made curate (clergyman in charge of a parish) of two parishes from which he drew a modest income and finally achieved a fair degree of financial security. In 1552 book four of Gargantua and Pantagruel was published. Rabelais died the following year, on a date unknown and under unclear circumstances.

Garagantua and Pantagruel: political commentary through satire

Gargantua and Pantagruel consists of a collection of four books released separately, and out of sequence, over a period of twenty years (1532–52); a fifth book was published in two parts (1562 and 1564) after Rabelais's death. Scholars are still disputing whether he wrote Book Five, as it was published under the pseudonym, or pen name, Master Alcofibras, which contains the letters of Rabelais's name.

Rabelais based Pantagruel (book two) on a popular collection of fanciful French tales about giants, set against a background of the Arthurian legend (medieval stories about the legendary English hero King Arthur). These tales were called Les grands et insetimables chroniques du géant Gargantua (Chronicles of Gargantua). Rabelais presented his own work as a sequel to the tales. He depicted the birth, education, and adventures of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel, both of whom are giants. Two other characters play prominent roles in the stories. In Gargantua (book one), Friar Jean represents a new type of monk, a worldly and dynamic one, who tills the earth and performs heroic feats against the army attacking his vineyards. In Pantagruel (book two), Panurge is a comic prankster who becomes Pantagruel's companion. Scholars suggest that the birth and the military exploits of the giants in both Gargantua and Pantagruel gave Rabelais the opportunity to support Christian humanism and the Protestant reform movement. The author was also influenced by classical writers of a literary form called Menippean satire, which is a loose collection of parodies, or comic imitations, of intellectual and religious figures.

In book three, published fourteen years later, Rabelais abandoned both the chronicle (history) structure and the theme of Gargantua and Pantagruel battling with other giants. Pantagruel and Panurge consult a series of religious oracles (people who can predict the future) and professional experts to determine if Panurge should get married. Books four and five tell of the mock epic voyage (long, trouble-filled sea journey made in a quest for truth) undertaken by Pantagruel and Panurge to meet the oracle of the bottle, from whom they hope to discover the final answer to their question.

Rabelais wrote Gargantua and Pantagruel during a period of religious and intellectual turmoil in Europe. The Protestant Reformation, with its emphasis on individual faith without the intervention of priests and church officials, was a serious challenge to traditional beliefs. Religious unrest and social conflict were met by opposition from the French monarchy. The genius of Rabelais's work is that he was able to criticize the church by using satire through a mixture of intellectual, religious, and common language. Some scenes are funny because they are so ridiculous, while others are shocking in their denunciation of church officials, intellectuals, and royals. For instance, in one scene a pompous English scholar seeks a debate in which only hand signals can be used, since he contends words cannot possibly penetrate the mysteries of truth. Panurge responds with a series of indecent gestures used to mock the learned fool Thaumaste (see accompanying box).

Gargantua and Pantagruel also contains harsh challenges to the church as an institution. The work was repeatedly condemned by the Paris theologians, but this did little to prevent it from becoming popular. Scholars note that Gargantua and Pantagruel most certainly influenced Don Quixote, the novel by Spanish author Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616; see entry). Rabelais also had an impact on modern writers, and the adjective "Rabelaisian" has come to mean any text that is characterized by extravagant and coarse humor.

Thaumaste Versus Panurge

In book two, chapter nineteen of Gargantua and Pantagruel, the giant Pantagruel's closest friend, Panurge, enters into a "debate" with the English scholar Thaumaste on behalf of Pantagruel. Unlike traditional debates in which each participant voices his or her argument in an agreed-upon language, Thaumaste and Panurge attempt to penetrate the Inner Mysteries of truth by using only hand signals. After agreeing upon the rules in chapter eighteen, Panurge and Thaumaste begin their argument in chapter nineteen. The following is a brief excerpt from the scene.

Then, with everyone attending and listening in perfect silence, the Englishman raised his two hands separately in the air, clenching all the tips of his fingers in the form that is known in the language of Chinon as the hen's arse, and struck the nails of one against the other four times. Then he opened them and struck the one with the flat of the other, making a sharp noise. Next, clenching them again, as before, he struck twice more and, after opening them, yet another four times. Then he joined them afresh and laid them one beside the other, as if offering up devout prayers to God.

Suddenly Panurge lifted his right hand in the air, and placed his thumb inside his right nostril, holding his four fingers stretched out and arranged in their natural order, parallel to the tip of his nose, shutting his left eye entirely and winking with the right, at the same time deeply depressing his eyebrows and lids. Then he raised his left hand, widely stretching and extending his four fingers and elevating the thumb, and held it in line directly continuous with that of the right, the distance between the two being two and a quarter feet. This done, he lowered both hands towards the ground in this same attitude, and finally held them half way up, as if aimed straight at the Englishman's nose.

The scene continues, with each exchange of hand gestures getting more ridiculous and obscene. Finally, Panurge is declared the winner by Thaumaste in chapter twenty. For Rabelais the purpose of this exchange was to ridicule the scholastic methods used by the church to interpret the Scriptures, or text of the Bible. By having Panurge show a perfect understanding of philosophy and truth through seemingly incomprehensible hand gestures, Rabelais is able to make his point without specifically saying what he means. This method of satire was used by many humanists, most notably Erasmus, in attempts to ensure their safety from the wrath of the Catholic Church and the Holy Roman Empire.

Source: Rabelais, François. Gargantua and Pantagruel. J. M. Cohen, translator. New York: Viking Penguin, 1976, p. 234.

For More Information

Books

Rabelais, François. Gargantua and Pantagruel. J. M. Cohen, translator. New York: Viking Penguin, 1976.

Web Sites

"François Rabelais." Bartlett's Quotations. [Online] Available http://www.bartleby.com/66/45/45745.html, April 5, 2002.

"Rabelais, François." Encyclopedia.com. [Online] Available http://www.encyclopedia.com/searchpool.asp?target=francois+rabelais&Submit.x=29&Submit.y=16, April 5, 2002.

"Rabelais, François." Informationplease.com. [Online] Available http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0840877.html, April 5, 2002.