The main manuscript of the Song of Roland was copied by an anglo-saxon scribe and is kept in Oxford. Un peu, madame. Je te prie, m'enseigner. Il faut que j'apprenne parler. Spenser, Sidney, the Elizabethan playwrights and Shakespeare, the metaphysical poets, Milton and also Bacon, Hobbes, Locke, Newton, etc. are almost unrecognized.
Nobody reads or speaks English, translations are rather uncommon.
In 1605, a wandering theatrical company played at the court of Henri IV a scene from Merry Wives of Windsor , but Shakespeare's name remains unknown. A journey to Paris by Ben Jonson leaves only the memory of a drunkard staggering along the streets and it will take the long exile in England of Saint-Evremond at the end of the century for him to mention The Merchant of Venice and to try his quill on a translation of Volpone. For these two centuries, I fear it was but a one-way relationship. The Renaissance of arts and letters is inspired by Italy, but France often is a mediator. English travellers cross the country.