Elfin Malherbe: The Influence of Malherbe on French Lyric Prosody, 1605 - 1674.

The University Press of Kentucky, (1971). First Edition. Octavo, cloth (hardcover), brown spine label, gilt letters, 354 pp. Fine in a Near-Fine, price-clipped dust jacket. From dust jacket: Critics and historians of French literature have for years accepted Francois de Malherbe as the fountainhead of French classical poetry, believing that he directly or indirectly influenced the production of most of the French poets of the seventeenth century. Those who opposed him blamed him for imposing restrictions on the century, while Boileau’s exultant proclamation of Malherbe as the savior of French poetry has been accepted as the ultimate verdict of the great classicist’s followers. Yet to admire a poet is not necessarily to imitate him, and to oppose him is not necessarily to deny his influence. Until the present study, the extent of Malherbe’s influence has never been fully documented. Mr. Abraham, by examining the prosody of most of the seventeenth-century poets, proves that seldom were Malherbe’s precepts actually followed in practice. In choice of poetic forms, rhymes, rhyme schemes, and language, few even attempted to attain Malherbe’s “classical ideal.” He shows, too, that Malherbe neither initiated the reaction to the sixteenth century poetic nor succeeded in establishing a “school.”