La Poésie oraculaire de Nostradamus: langue, style et genre des 'Centuries' (review)

This book, which was first presented as a doctoral dissertation, aims to reconcile the different critical trends that surround the figure of Nostradamus and his famous text the Centuries by attempting to show that Nostradamus was neither just a prophet nor just a poet but both. The inclusive approach of Anna Carlsted, while it does not neglect the esoteric speculations that have accompanied the Centuries since it was first published in 1555, grounds itself more in a philological and historical perspective. To show that Nostradamus is the best representative of the genre defined as 'poético-oraculaire' and that his quatrains are doubly poetic and prophetic, Carlsted undertakes a rigorous and detailed quantitative stylistic and linguistic analysis which she enriches by a comparative study with the works of the other famous poets of the time such as Ronsard, Scève and Du Bellay among others. A quantitative approach allows Carlsted to put hypotheses to the test and shows clearly that Nostradamus, aware of the common literary and esthetical usages of the time, followed them and, when he did not, it was because he was taking poetic licence deliberately to add ambiguity and obscurity to his poetry. Carlsted's study of Nostradamus' use of language and themes strengthens her argument that Nostradamus is not only a prophet of the past as claimed by R. Prévost, nor is he only a prophet of doom for the future as Dumézil or M. E. Roth-Rose would have it; neither is he just a failed poet, nor as Crouzet describes him just 'un poète à couper le souffle'. Rather, he is all of these, poet and prophet, and thus not so different from the other poets of the time. At the same time, Nostradamus manages to conjoin more intimately poetry and prophecy, helped in this by a melancholic disposition that added to his prophecies and visions an apocalyptic taint. Carlsted's inclusive argument is convincing and intriguing. My only objection lies in the rapidity with which Carlsted concludes that Nostradamus is perhaps less of a prophet and more a humanist. Caring for humankind, Nostradamus' poetry expresses the despair of human beings facing the 'glaive de la mort'. This definition of humanism is vague and could have gained by being better placed within its sixteenth-century context and by being examined in relation to the notion of prophet, as not making a clear difference between the two notions seems to render the argument circular: are all humanists prophets? Does being called a prophet exclude being called a humanist? In what sense can a prophet who cares for humankind at the behest of God be a humanist? These questions only underscore the fact that this well organised and stimulating study constitutes an important contribution to Nostradamus scholarship and will definitely encourage readers to appreciate the poetry as well as the prophecies of the famous quatrains.