Georges de Brébeuf

Georges de Brébeuf (* 1617 in Torigni-sur-Vire , † September 24, 1661 in Caen ) was a French writer and translator of the Baroque and early Classical periods.

life and work

Brébeuf studied in Caen and Paris. He knew Pascal and Corneille personally and was friends with Conrart , Ménage , Chapelain and Mézeray . His most important work is the verse translation of the Bellum civile (or: Pharsalia ) by Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (1654–1655). He caused the greatest sensation with the burlesque repositioning of this text ud T. Lucain travesty (Der travestierte Lukan, ie the one in a travestymocked Lukan, 1656). An illness that had been on the horizon for some time forced him to give up his role as court poet and to retreat to his younger brother's monastery. There he composed extensive prayers and meditations, which have recently been reissued, and died at the age of 44, leaving behind a theological text (published posthumously by his brother) in which he proves that Calvin's was part of the teaching of Catholics Church criticized points did not justify a schism .

Georges de Brébeuf was the nephew of Saint Jean de Brébeuf and the older brother of Nicolas de Brébeuf (1631-1691), prior of the monastery of Saint-Gerbold in Venoix near Caen .

Works

• L'Aenéide de Virgile en vers burlesques. Livre septiesme , Paris, Augustin Courbé, 1650.
• (Translation and rewrite ) La Pharsale de Lucain, ou les Guerres civiles de César et de Pompée en vers françois , Paris, A. de Sommaville, 1654–1655 (several editions).
• Lucain travesty, ou les Guerres civiles de César et de Pompée en vers enjoués , Paris, A. de Sommaville, 1656 (several editions).
• Poésies diverses , Paris, A. de Sommaville, 1658.
  • (Selection) La Gageure ou Cent cinquante épigrammes et madrigaux contre des femmes fardées , Paris, Éditions de la Nouvelle Revue française, 1920.
• Entretiens solitaires, ou Prières et méditations pieuses en vers françois , Paris, A. de Sommaville, 1660 (dedicated to Cardinal Mazarin, several editions; content: request for forgiveness. Unreliability of man. Fickleness. Sweet divine love. Humility. Obligation to give thanks to God. Desire to repent. Injustice to deny God. Bad conscience. Sinful hardening. Behavior of the virtuous. Regret over postponed repentance. Detachment from the things of this world. Struggle between sin and grace. Inclination to vice. Request for complete repentance. Divine versus human clarity, charity and selfishness [ Et quand je vous ai cru mon objet le plus doux, / Au lieu de vous chercher, je me cherchais en vous ], virtue without effort, detachment from all things, piety always and everywhere possible. Eternal torment as a result of sin. The Mother of God. Sweetness of seclusion. Reasons for the contempt for oneself).
  • critical ed. by René Harmand, Paris, E. Cornély, 1912.
  • "Les entretiens solitaires" by Georges de Brébeuf , critical ed. by Thierry Brunel, Diss. University of Lyon 3, 2009 (printed 2011).
• Éloges poétiques , Paris, A. de Sommaville, 1661.
• Les Oeuvres de M. de Brébeuf, nouvellement mises au jour , ed. by Nicolas de Brébeuf, 2 vols., Paris, J. Ribou, 1664.
• La Défence de l'Église romaine , ed. by Nicolas de Brébeuf, Paris, J.-B. Loyson, 1671 (against Calvin; for the veneration of saints and relics, the sacrament of confession, the doctrine of transubstantiation, the sacrifice of the mass, the bread communion, the meaning of good works, purgatory, etc.).

literature

• René Harmand, Essai sur la vie et les œuvres de Georges de Brébeuf (1617?, 1661) , Paris, 1897; Geneva, Slatkine, 1970.
• Richard Lewis Brodesky, The art of meditation in the Entretiens solitaires , Diss. Harvard 1973.
• Jean-Claude Ternaux, Lucain et la littérature de l'âge baroque en France , Paris, Champion, 2000.
• De la grande rhetorique à la poésie galante. L'exemple des poètes caennais aux XVIe et XVIIe siècles. Actes du colloque organisé à l'Université de Caen Basse-Normandie les 8 et 9 mars 2002 , Caen, Presses universitaires de Caen, 2004.

Manual literature

• Alain Viala , in: Laffont-Bompiani. Le nouveau dictionnaire des auteurs de tous les temps et de tous les pays , Paris 1994, pp. 456-457 (Bouquins series).
• Alain Viala, in: Dictionnaire des écrivains de langue française , ed. by Jean-Pierre Beaumarchais, Daniel Couty and Alain Rey, Paris, Larousse, 2001, p. 251.

Web links

• Literature by and about Georges de Brébeuf in the SUDOC catalog (Association of French University Libraries)