The Exile's Defense: DuBellay's La Deffence et illustration de la langue françoyse

Abstract

Although critics have found La Deffence full of contradictions, they have not seen its conceptual and tonal shifts as defensive strategies reflecting Du Bellay’s ambivalence toward ancient literature. His filial piety conflicts with his desire to rival the ancients by achieving poetic greatness in the vernacular. His ambiguous theory of imitation shows the conflict between reverence and rivalry in its portrayal of imitation both as an organic process and as a violent power struggle in which the French poet devours or rapes ancient models. A similarly equivocal stance toward classical literary power appears in Du Bellay’s Roman sonnets, which illuminate La Deffence by defining a state of exile in which the Renaissance poet is torn between past and future, Rome and France. In La Deffence, the exile’s voice emerges as a dialogue that expresses the paradoxical desire to be both like and unlike the great classical originals.