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Gargantua and Pantagruel
7François Rabelais
Rabelais's 1534 comic giants — the word "Rabelaisian" entered every European language for a reason; the source of comic-grotesque literature from Sterne to Bulgakov.
GBM Assessment (Score: 7/10)
François Rabelais' Gargantua and Pantagruel is a sprawling, exuberant work of satirical fiction that celebrates the grotesque, the carnivalesque, and the limitless possibilities of language and imagination. The term "Rabelaisian" has entered the language to describe anything characterized by earthy, bawdy humor and extravagant invention, and the novel laid the foundation for the entire tradition of satirical fiction.
The work was drafted during the French Renaissance, Gargantua and Pantagruel became the subject of Mikhail Bakhtin's signal 1965 study of carnival and the grotesque body, which established Rabelais as a figure of central importance to literary theory. The work influenced Jonathan Swift, Laurence Sterne, and James Joyce, and its exuberant spirit continues to animate the tradition of comic and satirical writing.
The Renaissance & Reformation, c. 1532-1580
Martin Luther's 95 Theses (1517) ignite the Protestant Reformation, permanently fracturing Western Christianity. His German Bible translation (NT 1522, complete 1534) democratizes scripture and establishes modern literary German. Luther relegates the Catholic deuterocanonical books to an appendix he calls 'Apocrypha,' establishing the 66-book Protestant canon. The Reformation triggers devastating religious wars across Europe, culminating in the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648), which kills an estimated 8 million and devastates Central Europe. Meanwhile, Machiavelli separates politics from morality. Columbus has reached the Americas. The printing press transforms the spread of ideas. Copernicus publishes (1543). Montaigne invents the personal essay in France.
Awards & Adaptations
Bakhtin's study. Influenced Swift, Sterne, Joyce.
Recommended Edition
J. Le Clercq (1936); T. Urquhart (1653)
