The Royal Tour of France by Charles IX and Catherine de’ Medici: Festivals and Entries 1564–6 by Victor E. Graham, W. McAllister Johnson (review)

HUMANITIES '4' Lawrence praises Williams's attempts to 'bring into his consciousness America itself, the still-unravished bride of silences.' Here also is Wallace Stevens with his review of Collected Poems 1921-1931, including the goading repetition of the phrase 'anti-poetic' which so infuriated Williams and which still continues to reverberate in critical discussions of the poet. We find Randall JaITell's two reviews of books of Paterson: enthusiasm for Book 1 and disenchantment with Book 4. Robert Lowell's notice of Book 2 of Paterson, praising Williams's 'combination of brilliance, sympathy, and experience: also appears. So does Leslie Fiedler's review of the same book, attacking Williams because he 'pursues absolutely the seen poem.' Consequently 'there is no song in him.' This, if true, would prove devastating, yet there is generally in Williams criticism a lack of textual analysis. Too often the poems are treated as footnotes in the history of an idea rather than as autonomous entities. It is a relief to find someone such as Alan Stephens engaging seriously with Williams's abiding concern with 'measure.' Such a consideration helps to remove some of the 'arbitrariness' from the poems and renders them more 'usable' to others. By the end of his career Williams had attained the status of an American classic, at least in the United States. In Britain during the 1950S and '960s, when his work first became available on any significant scale, the pattern of incomprehension and resistance was repeated. 'The case of William Carlos Williams remains the rock on which Anglo-American literary opinion splits: Donald Davie starts a review in December 1964, adding that 'Williams' intrinsic achievement is altogether more precarious and perverse' than his admirers will admit.The battle over Williams's position in the canon continues; the jury is still out. Charles Doyle offers a helpful introduction outlining the general history of critical response to Williams. For supplementary reading there is Paul L. Mariani's William Carlos Williams: The Poet and His Critics (1975), which provides an extremely useful commentary on the subject including many of the texts printed here. (ERIC DOMVILLE) Victor E. Graham and W. McAllister Johnson. The Royal Tour of France by Charles IX and Catherine de' Medici: Festivals and Entries '564-6 University of Toronto Press '979. Pp X, 472, illus. $50.00 To understand the Renaissance vision of the world, that ideal Platonic universe in which all the arts united to celebrate the triumph of Beauty, Truth, and Goodness, one can do no better than study the magnificent festivals and royal entries of the Valois kings of France. The key concepts governing the political, moral, and aesthetic theories of the period are to be found in the elaborate decorations, festivities, and ceremonies sUITounding the monarch and his court during tours of his kingdom and important international conferences, such as the one planned by Catherine de' Medici with Philip II of Spain at Bayonne in 1565. It is within such a context that the importance of this splendid volume, the third to appear at the University of Toronto Press, under the jOint authorship of Professors VictorGraham (DepartmentofFrench) and McAllisterjohnson (Department of Fine Art), can best be measured, and its contribution to research into aspects of literary and artistic collaboration be seriously analysed. The scholarship is impeccable, the illustrations magnificently reproduced, and the printed text in its clear and elegant type a joy to read: it is a fitting reminder of the Renaissance humanistic tradition of close collaboration between writer and printer. As in their previous volumes, Estienne Jodelle 'Le Recueil des inscriptions 1558': A Literary and Iconographical Exegesis (1972) and The Paris Entries of Charles IX and Elisabeth of Austria 1571, With an Analysis of Simon Bouquet's 'Brefet sommaire recueil' (1974), the authors have assembled an impressive number oforiginal documents, dtawn from a wide range ofcontemporary sources, suchas those tobefound in municipal and departmental archives along the route of the royal entries. In addition they consulted royal acts and correspondence, notably that ofCatherine de' Medici, and the official 'Comptes de bouche' which recorded daily expenditures of the king's household, and the 'Extraordinaire de I'argenterie' for 1565 which reveals the vast sums of...