Adam Horsley, Libertines and the Law: Subversive Authors and Criminal Justice in Early Seventeenth-Century France (Oxford: Oxford University Press / British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship Monographs, 2021), 432 pp.
Following the assassination of Henri IV in 1610, the political turbulence of Louis XIII's early reign led to renewed efforts to police the book trade during a golden age of so-called 'libertine' literature. Libertines and the Law examines the notorious trials of three subversive authors. The Italian naturalist philosopher Giulio Cesare Vanini was brutally executed for blasphemy by the Parlement de Toulouse in 1619. The Jewish convert Jean Fontanier was burned at the stake two years later in Paris for authoring a text refuting Christian teaching. Finally, the trial of the infamous poet Théophile de Viau for irreligion, obscenity, and poetic descriptions of homosexuality proved to be a landmark in French literary and social history, despite the poet eventually escaping the death penalty in 1625.
These trials are contextualised with a conceptual history of libertinism, as well as an exploration of literary censorship and the mechanics of the criminal justice system in early modern France. Drawing from legal manuals, rarely explored archival sources, newly discovered documents, and forgotten witness testimonies, Libertines and the Law provides new insights into the censorship of French literature and thought from the perspectives of both the defendants and the magistrates. Through a diverse corpus including poetry, philosophical texts, religious polemics, Jewish teachings, private memoirs, and seventeen images of the relevant trial records, it sheds new light on this crucial period in literary, legal, and intellectual history.
Hardback
Published: 14 October 2021
432 Pages | 17 Illustrations
ISBN: 9780197267004