Charles Perrault

See also: Perrault

Charles Perrault , born the January 12th 1628 with Paris where he died the May 16th 1703, is a Man of letters French, remained celebrates for its Contes of my mother Oye .

Charles Perrault was born in a middle-class family, of Pierre Perrault and Paquette the Clerk. The last of a family of seven children, it loses in 6 months his/her twin brother François. His/her father, originating in Turns, was parliamentary in Paris. Brother of the Scientific Architect and Claude Perrault, it makes brilliant literary studies with the Collège of Beauvais to Paris of which it tells, in his Mémoires , which being raises there of philosophy, it left the class following a discussion with his professor, in company of one of his comrades. Both decided not to turn over more to the college, and they are reflected with heat with the reading of the crowned and profane authors, of the Fathers of the church, the Bible, the French history, making of all the translations and the extracts. It is following this singular amalgamates free studies which it put in worms burlesques the sixth book of Énéide and wrote the Walls of Troy or the Origin of burlesque the .

Receipt lawyer in 1651 after having obtained its license of right, it is registered with the Barreau but, being bored soon “to trail a dress in the Palate”, it enters in the capacity as clerk in his brother who was general receiver of finances.

Right-hand man of Colbert, it is in charge of the artistic and literary policy of Louis XIV in 1663 as a secretary of meeting of the Petite Academy, then as an general inspector of the Superintendence of the buildings of the king. Consequently, Perrault the USA of the favor of the minister to the profit of the letters, the Science S and the Art S. It was not foreign with the project according to which pensions were distributed to the writers and the scientists of France and Europe.

Academies

Perrault also contributed to the foundation of the Academy of Science and to the reconstitution of the Académie of painting. It formed part, right from the start, of the commission of the currencies and inscriptions which became the Académie of the inscriptions and the humanities. Entered to the French Academy in 1671, it gave to it the idea of the attendance fees, to make public the meetings of reception and to make the elections “by poll and tickets, so that each one was in a full freedom to name which it would like. ” It is him still which writes the foreword of the Dictionnaire of the Academy in 1694.

With died of Colbert in 1683, it knows disgrace and loses at the same time loads and pensions.

May 1st 1672, it had married Marie Guichon, of more than twenty years its junior, of which it had four children. It became widowed in 1678.

Works

Perrault was a touch-with-all arts person who tested himself with the gallant kind with Dialog of the love and the friendship (1660) and the Mirror or the Metamorphosis of Orante . All its literary productions were limited to some light poetries, like the Portrait of Iris , when it lute with the Academy, the January 27th 1687, a poem entitled: the Century of Louis Large the . This poem, where Perrault, speaking with relatively little respect Homère, Ménandre and révérés among the classic authors, placed for the first time above every previous century, holds an important place in the history of the letters in what it inaugurates the Querelle of Old and of Modern the. Perrault, which will be the leader of the partisans of the Modern ones, there explains the equality necessary between the various ages by a natural law:

to form the spirits like forming the bodies,

nature in any time makes the same efforts;
Its being is immutable, and this easy force
Of which it produces all is not exhausted:
Jamais the star of the day that today we see
did not have the crowned face of more brilliant rays;
Jamais in spring the empourprées pinks
Of sharper incarnates were not coloured.
…………………………….
Of this same hand the infinite forces
Produce in any time of similar geniuses.

To this reading, Boileau rose furious, saying that it was a shame to support it. Other academicians, who saw a flattery for themselves there, applauded highly. Racine ironically congratulated Perrault to have carried out this play of spirit so well and to have so perfectly returned the opposite of what he thought. Thus was born one from most famous literary quarrels, if it is true, as one said, than was to answer Racine that Perrault undertook a methodical demonstration of its thesis and published the Parallèle the old ones and modern (Paris, 1688 - 1698, 4 vol. in-12), work spiritually written in the form of dialog between an erudite president and a little heading, a light, pleasant and bold knight, and an abbot which represents moderation.

Boileau answered by epigram S and in the Réflexions on Longin . In this discussion, where the adversaries were at the same time reason and wrong to different point of view, and where, according to each one their way, they were retorted without being answered, Perrault gained in general by urbanity. It was insulted, it counteracted of a spiritually released tone:

the pleasant argument where we have fun

Passera, without finishing, until the future races;
We will always say reasons,
They will always say insults.

Perrault was however let go to some words too sharp in its Apologie for the women , whom it published in 1694, to answer the satire of Boileau against the women. The two enemies were reconciled, at least seemingly, in 1700 and their quarrel was continued by other writers.

Perrault had begun in 1696 and finished in 1701 a work entitled the famous Men who appeared in France during this century (2 vol. in-fol.), collection of one hundred two Biographie S, short, precise and exact, accompanied by splendid engraved portraits.

But what made the immortal popularity of Charles Perrault, it is neither this rich person publication, nor his literary discussions, it is small volume entitled Contes of my mother Oye, or Stories of last time (1697, small in-12, very rare and counterfeited edition the same year) that it published under the name of his young person wire, Perrault d' Armancourt.

The Tales

Chronology of the editions

In 1691, Perrault publishes a “news” in worms:
  • the Marchioness of Salusses or the Patience of Griselidis

In 1693, it publishes a first “tale in worms” in the gallant Mercure :

In 1694, it joins together in the same edition two preceding works and a third history adds to it:

  • Skin of Ass

In 1696 appears in the gallant Mercure a tale in prose Sleeping Beauty . The following year, leaves to Claude Barbin a volume entitled Histoires or Tales the time spent with moralities (1697). This volume contains the eight following tales:

The paternity of the Tales

It makes appear its collection under the name of its third wire, Pierre Darmancour, or of Armancour, Armancour being the name of the field that Charles has just acquired and to offer to Pierre. This last, born in 1678, aspired to becoming secretary of Miss , niece of Louis XIV, with whom is dedicated the work.

Moreover, Perrault wanted to avoid a new polemic between Anciens and Modern (he was the leader of the latter) with the publication of its Contes . It had been reconciled with Boileau in 1694. The name of his/her son thus was to him of a great help to avoid the resumption of the quarrel.

The masterpiece of Perrault

In 1683, Perrault, having lost at the same time its station with the Academy and his wife, decides to be devoted to the education of his/her children and writing the Tales of my mother Oye (1678).

The kind of the fairy tales is with the mode in the living rooms society men: the members of the high society attend taken care popular and note the stories which are told there. Its collection entitled Tales of my mother Oye , where the tales are at the same time of oral inspiration (the “Mother Oye” appoints the nurse who tells stories with the children) and arts person (Boccace had already written a first version of Beautiful with Wood sleeping). Work that Perrault operates on this already existing matter, they is that it them moralise and in fact of the tools “to the teaching of the young children”. Thus, it adds moralities at the end of each tale, announcing which values it illustrates.

Marc Soriano known as of Perrault which it “is the most ignored of traditional”: everyone knows its tales, but very little know its version of the tales: thus, at Perrault, the Little Red Riding Hood and his grandmother finish eaten by the wolf: the posterior version where the hunter the fate of the belly is of Grimm. In the same way, it is in Disney that the kiss of the prince awakes Sleeping Beauty: at Perrault, it awakes all alone. And the posterity preferred to keep only what Perrault called the “very dry tale”, i.e. the fairy tale, by forgetting moralities…

References and notes

Random links:Brad Wilk | Phytic acid | James Wilson (navigator) | Sorgà | Low Amazonas | Langue_d'Akkadian