Christmas of Fail

Christmas of Fail , lord of Hérissaye, born towards 1520 in the family property of Castle-Letard with Saint-Erblon (Ille-et-Vilaine) and died in 1591 with Rennes, lawyer and writer French.

Its work, at the same time diverting and serious, constitutes an interesting testimony on the rural company of the 16th century in Brittany.

Presentation

Resulting from a family of rural minor nobility, made Fail of the studies of right and obtains a load with the présidial Rennes in 1552. As a magistrate, it writes the Mémoires collected and extracted most notable and solemn the arrests of the Parliament of Brittany (1579).

This contemporary member of Parliament of Rabelais, true cantor of High Brittany of 16th century, was born about 1520 in the family manor from Létard Castle in Saint-Erblon.Son François father from Fail, was a rural gentleman of average fortune and average nobility whose family was established on this ground since the 14th century. Christmas of Fail passed his childhood with his four brothers and sisters, in the middle of a nature which he will like and be able to describe, before being sent to Vern where he made his first humanities under the direction of a Master of studies, named Caillard.

As it was not the elder one, Christmas of Fail was probably intended early for the dress. About 1540, it left its family to undertake legal studies. One finds it in the universities of Poitiers, of Angers, of Bourges, of Toulouse where it carried out the merry life of the students of the time. But of the financial problems the conduisirentà to stop its studies to go guerroyer in Italie.A Lyon, where it finished its university formation, it published er 1547, at Jean de Tournes, his " Matter rustiques" in which it puts in scene four jolly fellows. Pastoral tables, actions of the villagers of the 16th century, truculent scenes have as a framework the countryside of Rennes. In this continuation of natural conversations, the remarks full with liveliness of Christmas of Fail, reveal a preserving gentleman persuaded of the superiority of the nobility and very attached to its prerogatives. Beyond the praise of the trade of farmer, the author, taking as a starting point the large old such Caton er Cicéron, enjoys to recall to the peasants their simple happiness. And especially that they take care well not to want to change their condition!

Today, of Fail is known like one of the principal storytellers of the French Rebirth, in particular for its rustic Propos (1547). The text describes the life of two villages of the surroundings of Rennes (Vindelles and Flameaux) and draws up the portrait of some of its more picturesque inhabitants through the memories of four old peasants. Oscillating between bucolic painting and comic the rabelaisien work, complex and gently satirist, lend themselves to multiple interpretations. Completely remarkable by the richness and the savor of its language, it remains one of rare works of our literature to be itself centered exclusively on the country world.

The Baliverneries d' Eutrapel (1548) and the the Tales and Speech of Eutrapel (1585) are same vein but, this time, the notable ones are put there in scene: the careful Polygamous one, cheating Lupold and merry Eutrapel. The dialog of the three men, mixing moral reflection and irony, is the pretext with a succession of fables and tables descriptive (fable of the drop and spider, description of a house of peasants…). The little stories in comic and anecdotic matter are initially there to amuse the reader in a text which wants to be above all diverting. But behind this lightness, verbal imagination and the picturesque one of the evocations, the work of Christmas of Fail, like those of all the large humanistic storytellers of its time, are constantly underlain by a whole of reflections morals, policies and nuns (Christmas of Fail was suspected of conversion to Protestantism) with the manner of a Montaigne or a Rabelais.

One would be wrong to confuse this original member of Parliament with the facetious writers of the same time and to see in him a simple storyteller grivois, a buffoon, a joker. He is one of the most declared representatives this " spirit of mischievousness of the good old man temps". He is the contemporary of a whole line of broad Gallic humors and faithful to the tradition of the French tale in verse. Holy-Beuve does not hesitate to bring Christmas closer to Fail " movement of literature which the extraordinary success of the Pantagruel" author had caused;.

After some mishaps caused by the disorders of the League, Christmas of Fail died out in Rennes on July 7th, 1591 without descent.

Quotations

"God gives good to the men and not men to the biens" ( Baliverneries or new Tales of Eutrapel )

"When the purse narrows, conscience élargit" ( Baliverneries or new Tales of Eutrapel )

"Goods offered are with half vendue" ( Baliverneries or new Tales of Eutrapel )

Works

rustic Remarks of maistre Leon Ladulfi, Champagne , Lyon, Jean de Tournes, 1547, in-8°
Baliverneries d' Eutrapel , Paris, 1548.
Tales and Speech of Eutrapel, by fire lord of Herissaye Breton gentleman , Rennes, No5el Glamet de Quinpercorentin, 1585, in-8°.

Modern republications

rustic Remarks of maistre Leon Ladulfi Champagne , 1547, ED. critical of Arthur of Borderie with the alternatives of the editions of 1548,1549,1573, Paris, Lemerre, 1878 (rééd. Slatkine, 1976).
rustic Remarks of maistre Leon Ladulfi Champagne , 1549, edition with introduction, notes and glossary establish by Gabriel-A. Perugia and Roger Dubuis, Geneva, Droz, 1994.
rustic Remarks , Translation in modern French by Aline Leclercq-Magnien, Paris, Editions Jean Picollec, 1988.
rustic Remarks and Baliverneries in French Storytellers of XVIe century , ED. Pierre Jourda, Gallimard, the Pleiad, 1965.

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