Reading for Week Five: Biclarel

Biclarel is an anonymous romance from the fourteenth century. It is a reworking in French of the twelfth century Anglo-Norman Bisclavret by Marie de France. Biclarel is extracted from a longer work called Le Roman de Renart le Contrefait. Le Roman de Renart is a twelfth century retelling of collection of fables (most of which are best known to us today as Aesop’s fables), and Le Roman de Renart le Contrefait is a further reworking of that twelfth century collection. The author gives some autobiographical details in Renart le Contrefait: he was in his early 40s when he began the text and his late 60s or early seventies when he completed it in 1342. He claims that he began to write out of boredom, having left the church for a woman. As we can see is in Biclarel he seems to regret that choice, and his writing, not just Biclarel, demonstrates a notable streak of misogyny.

Reading from:

Hopkins, Amanda, trans. “Biclarel” in Melion and Biclarel: Two Old French Werwolf Lays. Ed. Amanda Hopkins. 2005, Print, The University of Liverpool.

Music:

Arden-Taylor, Paul. Medieval Dance Tunes Sequence.