{"id":3468,"date":"2014-10-16T09:59:45","date_gmt":"2014-10-16T13:59:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/?p=3468"},"modified":"2014-10-16T09:59:45","modified_gmt":"2014-10-16T13:59:45","slug":"a-poet-killer-thief-brawler-and-vagabond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/2014\/10\/16\/a-poet-killer-thief-brawler-and-vagabond\/","title":{"rendered":"A poet, killer, thief, brawler, and vagabond…."},"content":{"rendered":"

This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items from the newly acquired Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Francois Villon was all of those things, and most prominently a subversive outsider. \u00a0At a time when most poetic works were strongly religious or allegorical Villon wrote with honesty about love and sex, drinking, money problems, and living on the road in 15th-century France. \u00a0Many of his works were meant to be read aloud, preferably in a tavern. \u00a0He is known to have influenced modern English poetry, particularly Ezra Pound. \u00a0This limited edition\u00a0of Villon’s works\u00a0and accompanying illustrations by Albert Dubout was published in France around 1933.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The text above is taken from Villon’s poem Bequests<\/em>,\u00a0whose premise is that Villon\u00a0is leaving the city after being spurned by a woman, so he must leave all of his possessions behind. \u00a0He details a long list of beneficiaries gifting them with worthless junk and items that he never owned, essentially mocking everyone and everything. \u00a0Most of Villon’s poems have a strong dose of social satire and a tone\u00a0of merry pranksterism.<\/p>\n

\"KIC<\/a><\/p>\n

This shorter poem translates to:<\/p>\n

I am Francois, which I find a burden,<\/strong><\/p>\n

born in Paris (near Pontoise),<\/strong><\/p>\n

and from the six-foot rope\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

my neck will learn what my ass weighs.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This poem could be read as a direct commentary of Villon’s life since he was indeed condemned to death in November of 1462. \u00a0The story goes that he was involved\u00a0in a\u00a0brawl where the Pope’s Paris notary\u00a0was stabbed by a\u00a0companion so he was sentenced to hang since he had already been jailed three times. \u00a0However, Villon appealed the case and his sentence was changed to a 10 year banishment from Paris. \u00a0Villon celebrated by writing both a poem taunting the prison clerk and then another lavishly praising the court. \u00a0Shortly thereafter he disappeared from public view.<\/p>\n

Though it is tempting\u00a0to look at Villon’s work as completely biographical many scholars contend that he created a mix of factual and fictional information to create this character of Villon featured in his works. \u00a0To see more illustrations by Dubout or recite some of Villon’s verse in French you can find this volume at Houghton Library. \u00a0Villon (oeuvres) \/illustrations de Dubout.Oeuvres. Paris : Gibert Jeune, Librairie d’Amateurs, [1933].\u00a0FC.V7195.B933v<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Thanks to Alison Harris, Santo Domingo Project Manager and Ryan Wheeler, Rare Book Cataloger, for contributing this post.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items from the newly acquired Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection. Francois Villon was all of those things, and most prominently a subversive outsider. \u00a0At a time when most poetic works were strongly religious or allegorical Villon wrote with honesty about love and sex, drinking, money problems, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4490,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[64929],"tags":[131659,128185,113736,1825,873],"class_list":["post-3468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-houghton-library","tag-albert-dubout","tag-francois-villon","tag-julio-mario-santo-domingo","tag-literature","tag-poetry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5TUly-TW","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4490"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3468"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5166,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468\/revisions\/5166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}