Racaut, Hatred in Print

Luc Racaut.  Hatred in Print: Catholic Propaganda and Protestant Identity during the French Wars of Religion.  Hants: Ashgate, 2002. 
Racaut writes of the Reformation that, “Although Protestants are almost universally recognized as heralds of progress, in France they conspicuously failed to convince the large French majority who remained Catholic (3).” Which begs the question, "why?"  To answer the query, at least in part, Racaut advocates for a reexamination of the relationship between the Reformation and print. The nascent print culture of the sixteenth century has often been credited for swelling the ranks of Protestantism; Racaut seeks to explore, rather, the production and impact of Catholic propaganda, which has been largely neglected in the historiography of the French Wars of Religion. While the Protestant Reformation was largely successful in the German territories, France remained a Catholic country and, according to Racaut, this ideological intransigence was in large part due to the efficacy of Catholic propaganda within the Hexagon.  He argues that, “the large body of Catholic literature…contributed strong and persuasive arguments to the Reformation debate (2)” and that “the French Wars of Religion were lost and won by the ability of Catholics and Huguenots to create and to block competing narratives and representations of each other (5).”  In the end, Catholic representations of Protestants, it could be said, won the hearts and minds of sixteenth-century Frenchmen.  But how?
Within France, Catholic propaganda drew its strength from its accessibility—in terms of its responsiveness (Catholics dominated the printing trade through royal sanction), its readability (it was written in vernacular) and its familiarity (it drew on traditional, time-worn arguments).  While, at times, French Protestants were able to turn Catholic rhetorical attacks to their advantage, it was often, Racaut argues, too little, too late.  In seeking to understand the disparity among the French relationship between print culture and the Reformation and that of other countries, which saw a decidedly different ideological outcome, the author examines the roots and effects of Catholic propaganda strategies to ascertain the manner by which they ultimately won the day.  Racaut examines, in turn, the impact of Catholic polemic on public opinion and violence toward Protestants, the success of anti-Protestant rhetoric rooted in traditional attacks of “blood libel,” insurrection, and “upside-down” gender instability, and, finally, the rhetorical recourse to the infamous, insurrectionary Albigensian sect, whose historic treachery provided a familiar lens through which the French could evaluate the Protestant "threat."
In the Reformation battle of the presses, Catholicism had an early, sustainable lead.  Racaut writes that since Calvin was unwilling to directly engage Catholic polemic, “it was left to clandestine printing centres within France to do this [and] because of the tight censorship that was operated in both Paris and Geneva, the badly needed Protestant response was limited in its scope and efficacy (12).”  To Protestant pamphlets that made their way into circulation, Catholics were armed for a quick, damaging response.  In examining Catholic propaganda, Racaut provides a valuable contribution to the historiography of the French Reformation and Wars of Religion.  Polemical charges of Protestant engagement in “blood libel,” insurrection, sexual promiscuity and gender reversals certainly provide insight into the “othering” process that led to the brutal inter-confessional violence that defined sixteenth-century France.  That being said, one must question the extent of the efficacy, as does Racaut, of print culture in the conversion of the French masses (the audience for printed books was largely the urban elite).  Instead, peripatetic preachers were largely responsible for the recruitment of “the masses” into the Protestant fold.  To this end, it would have been useful (though, arguably, difficult) to examine the role of oral culture in the Catholic counter-propagandizing effort.  Generally, though, the book adds much to the (heretofore largely one-sided) debate on the role of print in the Reformation. 
Category:Reformation
Category:French Reformation