François du Souhait
Encyclopedia
François du Souhait was a French language
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

 author (translator, novelist, poet, satirist, moral philosopher) of the late 16th and early 17th century from the Duchy of Lorraine (at the time, a sovereign court with ties to France).

Life

François du Souhait was born to a noble family in the Champagne
Champagne (province)
The Champagne wine region is a historic province within the Champagne administrative province in the northeast of France. The area is best known for the production of the sparkling white wine that bears the region's name...

 region. He became "secrétaire ordinaire" to Charles III, Duke of Lorraine
Charles III, Duke of Lorraine
Charles III , known as the Great, was Duke of Lorraine from 1545 until his death.-History:He was the eldest surviving son of Francis I, Duke of Lorraine, and Christina of Denmark...

 (between 1600 et 1605), and later Henry I, Duke of Lorraine (from 1608), and several of his works are dedicated to high-ranking members of the Lorraine court, including Princess Catherine of Lorraine and the brothers François de Bassompierre
François de Bassompierre
François de Bassompierre was a French courtier.The son of Christophe de Bassompierre , he was born at the castle of Haroué in Lorraine...

 and Jehan de Bassompierre. Du Souhait lived for many years in France, but he was apparently banished in 1614 for having contributed to a scabrous satirical poetry collection. One biographer (Jean Serroy) believes that while in France Du Souhait frequented the literary circle around Marguerite de Valois
Marguerite de Valois
Margaret of Valois was Queen of France and of Navarre during the late sixteenth century...

 (through the intervention of his friend, fellow author Jacques Corbin).

Writings

Du Souhait was the author of seven novels, a collection of short stories (for which he is today most well-known), a collection of poems, a pastoral
Pastoral
The adjective pastoral refers to the lifestyle of pastoralists, such as shepherds herding livestock around open areas of land according to seasons and the changing availability of water and pasturage. It also refers to a genre in literature, art or music that depicts such shepherd life in an...

, a tragedy
Tragedy
Tragedy is a form of art based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of...

 in 5 acts, a translation of the Iliad
Iliad
The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...

, and several works of moral and didactic philosophy. Of his seven novels, only his first two seem to have had a certain commercial success (four editions each, both in Paris and Lyon). As a novelist, Du Souhait's early works participated in the same tradition of the "sentimental novel" as authors Antoine de Nervèze
Antoine de Nervèze
Antoine de Nervèze was a French nobleman and writer of novels, translations, letters and moral works at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th centuries.-Biography:...

 and Nicolas des Escuteaux
Nicolas des Escuteaux
Nicolas des Escuteaux was a French novelist from the early 17th century.-Life:He was born into a noble family in the region around Loudun...

, although Du Souhait differs from these authors both in his content (he paints a far less idealized portrait of love and includes occasional satirical/realistic elements) and in his sometimes awkward style (especially in his "tit-for-tat" gallant dialogues). Like these other authors, in his later works Du Souhait moved away from the sentimental toward the longer adventurous novel with pastoral elements. Du Souhait's ear for oral discourse and his satirical side are most apparent in his short story collection Histoires comiques ou entretiens facetieux (Paris, 1612). Du Souhait also contributed laudatory poems to the prefatory material of works by Timothée de Chillac and Pierre de Deimier.

Du Souhait's seven novels are:
  • Les amours de Poliphile et de Mellonimphe (Lyon, 1599), (Paris, 1600), (Lyon, 1605), (Lyon, 1610)
  • Les amours de Palemon, suitte de Poliphile (Lyon, 1599), (Paris, 1600), (Lyon, 1602), (Lyon, 1605)
  • Les amours de Glorian et d'Ismene (Paris, 1600)
  • Les Proprietez d'amour et les propretez des amans, contenant une histoire des amours de Filine et de Polymante (Paris, 1601)
  • Les Chastes Destinees de Cloris ou le Roman des histoires de ce temps (Paris, 1609)
  • Le Romant d’Anacrine, où sont representes plusieurs Combats, Histoires veritables & Amoureuses (Paris, 1613)
  • Le Romant de Gloriande, ou suitte du roman d’Anacrine, où sont continuees les Histoires du premier volume: Avec plusieurs autres nouvelles et force belles avantures (Paris, 1613), (Paris, 1630).

See also

  • French literature of the 17th century
    French literature of the 17th century
    17th-century French literature was written throughout the Grand Siècle of France, spanning the reigns of Henry IV of France, the Regency of Marie de Medici, Louis XIII of France, the Regency of Anne of Austria and the reign of Louis XIV of France...

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