1911 Reviews

Laumonier, Paul, Ronsard, poete lyrique

Ruutz-Rees, C.

It sometimes befalls a literary reputation to be shown so forcibly in one given aspect that every other would seem excluded even for the most independent of investigators. Such, as all know, was the case with that of Ronsard after Malherbe and Boileau had spoken their word; and such its fate once more, as has been less observed, since Romanticists and Parnassians set the great poet of the Pléiade upon his rightful throne. For, despite Sainte-Beuve's judicious connection of his name with that of Marot, Ronsard has remained for readers—and in general for critics—of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, not merely a great poet come at last to his own, but a great innovator also, one who broke with national tradition and set the feet of poetry in paths entirely new. As this was the view of himself proclaimed with vigor by Ronsard at the beginning of his career, it is not surprising that it should have obtained in the revival no less than in the eclipse of his reputation.