The art of loving in the Middle-Ages: the Roman de la Rose

from November 6, 2012 to February 17, 2013 Arsenal Library

The Roman de la Rose is a courtly and learned “Art d’aimer”. There are about 22 000 lines in this poem written in the 13th century by Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun. The poem takes the form of an allegorical fantasy telling how a young man, the lover, conquered the heart of a Rose, the young girl.

The framework of the story is rather loose, underpinned by cynical pieces of advice worthy of Ovide and peppered with scholarly considerations.

At the end of a well-argued debate, the “Roman” invites readers to favour life forces and ignore tensions inherent to courtly love and conjugal morality. Both a charming, misogynous, codified and subversive poem, the Roman de la Rose gave rise, in the early 15^th century, to a literary quarrel in which Christine de Pisan, the first “feminist” author distinguished herself.

Discovering the BnF’s illuminated manuscripts of the Roman de la Rose, visitors will also discover the literary and cultural material of this major piece of medieval literature.