Rutebeuf - Works

French wandering minstrel and poet, whose name may have been a pseudonym. He lived in Paris, and led a wandering life after an unhappy marriage (1261), recorded in his Mariage Rutebeuf. He sought the protection of Louis IX, and then of Anne de Poitiers. His many and varied compositions marked the development of the trouvères, and his pungent commentaries are considered the first expression of popular opinion in French literature. His works include a work on local politics, Dit des Cordeliers (1249), and he changed subject for his masterpiece, Le Miracle de Théophile (c.1260, a prototype of the Faust story). His real strength as a poet lay in his lively satires, notably against the friars, and he defended the University of Paris against the attacks of the religious orders. In a popular vein was Le Dit de l'herberie, a comic-monologue by a quack doctor, and he also wrote humorous verse stories (fabliaux). He wrote finally in support of the Crusades in Complaintes d'Outre mer and De Constantinople.

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Rutebeuf, or Rustebuef (ca. He frequently plays in his verse on the word Rutebeuf, which was probably a nom de guerre, and is variously explained by him as derived from rude boeuf and rude oeuvre. In Le Mariage de Rutebeuf he says that on the 2 January 1261 he married a woman old and ugly, with neither dowry nor amiability. In the Complainte de Rutebeuf he details a series of misfortunes which have reduced him to abject destitution. In these circumstances he addresses himself to Alphonse, comte de Poitiers, brother of Louis IX, for relief. for his metrical Life of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary was written by request of Erard de Valery, who wished to present it to Isabel, queen of Navarre; and he wrote elegies on the deaths of **AnCeau de ITsle Adam**, the third of the name, who died about 1251, Eudes, comte de Nevers (d. 1270), and Alphonse, comte de Poitiers (d. In the Pauvrete de Rutebeuf he addresses Louis IX himself.

The piece which is most obviously intended for popular recitation is the Dû de L'Herberie, a dramatic monologue in prose and verse supposed to be delivered by a quack doctor.

Rutebeuf's serious work as a satirist probably dates from about 1260. He was a redoubtable champion of the University of Paris in its quarrel with the religious orders who were supported by Pope Alexander IV, and he boldly defended Guillaume de Saint-Amour when he was driven into exile. To his later years belong his religious poems, and also the Voie de Paradis, the description of a dream, in the manner of the Roman de la Rose.

The best work of Rutebeuf is to be found in his satires and verse contes. A miracle play of his, Le Miracle de Théophile, is one of the earliest dramatic pieces extant in French.

Works

The Oeuvres of Rutebeuf were edited by Achille Jubinal in 1839 (new edition, 1874); de la France (1842), vol.