The Poetry of François Villon
Subtitle: Text and Context (Cambridge Studies in French)
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: May 21, 2001
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 250
ISBN-13: 9780521792707
Subjects: Literary studies: general; Poetry & poets: classical, early & medieval; Villon, FranÃ°cois,; Literary Criticism; Poetry; French; Europe; b. 1431; Continental European; European - General; Literary Collections / Continental European; Villon, Franðcois,--b. 1431--Criticism and interpretation; Criticism and interpretation; Villon, Francois,; Villon, Franðcois,
First sentence: When Harold Bloom coined the phrase 'anxiety of influence',2 when he pictured poets entering into a psychic struggle to create their own imaginative space, when he spoke of their agonised recognition of their own belatedness, poets all over the world surely nodded their acquiescence.
Description: "This book casts new light on the work of Francois Villon, one of the most famous but least understood poets of the later Middle Ages. Traditionally Villon has been viewed by scholars as an alienated outsider in his own time, whose work was in many respects derivative and commonplace. Jane Taylor instead points to the flair and originality of Villon's poetry, and the urgency and brilliance of his poetic dialogue with his predecessors and contemporaries. Taylor describes Villon's literary milieu as marked by an enjoyment of debate and competition, and shows the prominent place that he occupied in that poetic landscape.

She argues that Villon's contemporaries were accustomed to reading in depth and in detail: they would have recognised and appreciated the flamboyance with which Villon challenged commonplace or ideological preconception."--Jacket.