Astrée

Astrée is a pastoral Roman published 1607 with 1627, by Honore d' Urfé.

major Literary work of the 17th century, Astrée is sometimes called the Novel of the novels , initially by its size, which makes that one regards it as the first Roman-fleuve of the French Littérature (5 parts, 40 stories, 60 books: 5399 pages), but also by the considerable success which it had in the very whole Europe (translated into large numbers of languages and read by all the courses European).

Today still, this extraordinary work is republished regularly, that it is in integral editions, in a format delivers pocket or even in Cartoon. The first three parts are published in 1607, 1610, and 1619 and when of Urfé dies in 1625, its secretary Balthazar Baro would have completed the fourth part and a continuation would have given him (1632 - 1633). But according to Larousse (1863), the fifth and sixth parts would have been composed by Pierre Boitel, sior of Gaubertin, and are published in 1626.

Synopsis

It would be difficult, even impossible to establish a kind of summary of Astrée , because this book is not qualified without reason of saga novel or work with drawers. Let us note all the same that it consists of 5 parts, 40 stories, 60 books and 5399 pages. But the red wire of this book remains the perfect history of love between the heroin (which gave its name to the book) Astrée and Céladon (character which gave its name to a type of ceramics, suitable for the China and with the the Far East). They are two Berger S foreziens. The perfidies of certain characters, the ambitions Political S of others, the mishaps Amour euses of the two heroes constitute most of this Romance extremely dense and complex, which contains various other adventures lived by characters not having any bond with the central history, but who illustrate by their lives, those lived by the principal protagonists.

Geographical location of work

Astrée is one novel country , which is held in the Forez, area located at north of Saint-Etienne, and which is evoked very eulogistically with the whole beginning of the book, with this famous introduction: Near the old town of Lyon, on the side of the setting sun, there is a country named Forez, which in its smallness contains what there is of rarer with the remainder of the Gaules… Several brooks in various places are bathing the plain of their clear waves, but one of most beautiful is Lignon, which wandering in its course, as well as doubtful in its source, goes curving by this plain from the high mountains of Cervières and Chalmazel until to Feurs where the Loire receiving it, and making him lose its proper name, carries it for tribute with the Océan.

The apparent pride of the author of the preceding text probably comes owing to the fact that it was itself living of the described area, and this in the Renaissance castle from the Bastie d' Urfé, built by his/her grandfather, Claude d' Urfé. Also, and it is in that the delivers perdure through the ages since its drafting, the Théâtre of the actions told in the book is always present in the Forez, and, having preserved the same names, the places and the routes are particularly favourable with the evocation of the Romance . The Lignon of Drill, still present today has an important place in the work of Honore d' Urfé, and is described in the following way by the author: … the course of this river, which passer by, against the walls of the town of Boën, seems to almost cut this plain by the medium, being gone to return below Feurs in the center of the Loire… . Astrée marked the spirit so much, that the Forez is also called Country of Astrée .

Influences

This work, by the simple fact of its resounding success, was read by an immense number people, and by there influenced many authors like Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Jean of the Fountain or Molière which during their Enfance and them Adolescence, was enchanted by Astrée . Also let us note that this work marks a turning in the world Littérature, and will have a considerable influence on the Romance , the Théâtre, the opera and the mentalities most various.

Astrée in mythology

The heroin which appears in the work of Honore d' Urfé is the character of the Greek Mythologie, who returns in Gaulle and that the author describes in this manner in the dedication of Volume III, that he made to the king, Girl of Jupiter and THEMIS: this Astrée that wise the Antiquité always took for justice… returned in the Gaulle S its old and more pleasant residence. With such a main character, Astrée is a prolific synthesis of the myths founders of the Europe where the search for a certain ethics, the topics of the Justice and Paix make this work an always contemporary vision of the world.

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