Between Sequence and Sirventes: Aspects of Parody in the Troubadour Lyric

by Catherine E. Léglu

Parody marks the troubadour lyric from the outset, informing composition, performance and reception. This ground breaking study moves away from courtliness, the focus of most previous studies, and places troubadour parodic preactice int he context of the social and spiritual debates of 12th and 13th century Occitania. Leglu analyses the complex relationship between troubadour verse and the Aquitanian para-liturgical Latin corpus. She charts the development of a chain of texts linked by a common formal mode derived from this Latin sequence and traces patterns of rewriting, ranging from scurrilous attacks, through playful competition, to recuperation of the sacred content in serious parody.

158 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2000

About the author

I am a medievalist specialising in Occitan and French literature, and currently Director of the University of Reading's Graduate Centre for Medieval Studies.

I am on the international committee of the 'Association internationale d'éudes occitanes' (AIEO)

I am a specialist in medieval French and Occitan literature. My PhD was in the satirical tradition of troubadour poetry. I have published on Old Occitan satirical and moralising verse, Old French lyric poetry (pastourelle and chansons de toile), and Middle French romance and didactic texts. My recent research has been on issues of mulitilingualism in French, Occitan and Catalan literature, as well as on the vernacular translation and adaptation of Latin didactic texts (e.g. Middle French versions of Valerius Maximus' Facta et dicta memorabilia). My current project, funded by the Leverhulme Trust (2011-13) is an edition of the Occitan version of a fourteenth-century universal history told largely through the medium of genealogies and images (British Library Egerton 1500), find out more by visiting the egerton 1500 blog

I also teach modern French Language, French for Managers, French cinema, and the cinematic adaptations of literary texts.