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Author:

Kenny, Neil, author.

Title:

Born to write : literary families and social hierarchy in early modern France / Neil Kenny.

Edition:

First edition.

Publisher:

Oxford University Press,

Copyright Date:

2020

Description:

xii, 407 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Subject:

1500-1699
Book industries and trade--France--History--16th century.
Book industries and trade--France--History--17th century.
Families in literature.
Authors, French--16th century--Biography.
Authors, French--17th century--Biography.
Families--France--History--16th century.
Families--France--History--17th century.
Authors, French.
Book industries and trade.
Families.
Families in literature.
Social conditions.
France--Social conditions--16th century.
France--Social conditions--17th century.
France.
Biographies.
History.
Literary criticism.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Summary:

Families were driving forces in the production-that is, in the composing, editing, translating, or publishing-of countless works. Relatives collaborated with each other, edited each other, or continued the unfinished works of deceased family members; some imitated or were inspired by the works of long-dead relatives. The reason why this second fact (about families) is connected to the first (about social hierarchy) is that families were in the period a basic social medium through which social0status was claimed, maintained, threatened, or lost. So producing literary works was one of the many ways in which families claimed their place in the social world. The process was however often fraught, difficult, or disappointing. If families created works as a form of socio-cultural legacy that might continue to benefit their future members, not all members benefited equally; women sometimes produced or claimed the legacy for themselves, but they were often sidelined from it. Relatives sometimes disagreed bitterly about family history, identity (not least religious), and so about the picture of themselves and their family that they wished to project more widely in society through their written works, whether printed or manuscript. So although family was a fundamental social medium out of which so many works emerged, that process could be conflictual as well as harmonious. The intertwined role of family and social hierarchy within literary production is explored in this book through the case of France, from the late fifteenth to the mid-seventeenth century. Some families are studied here in detail, such as that of the most widely read French poet of the age, Clement Marot. But the extent of this phenomenon is quantified too: some two hundred families are identified as each containing more than one literary producer, and in the case of one family an extraordinary twenty-seven.

ISBN:

0198852398
9780198852391

OCLC:

(OCoLC)1125996541

LCCN:

2019951162

Locations:

OVUX522 -- University of Iowa Libraries (Iowa City)