Les Satyres

155 x 105 mm.

Régnier, Mathurin (1573-1613). The Satires of Sieur Régnier. Revised & Newly Enlarged. Dedicated to the King.
Paris, Toussaincts du Bray, rue Saint Jacques, at the Ripe Ears of Wheat & in his shop at the Palace, in the gallery of the prisoners. M.DC.XIII. With royal privilege (1613).

Original edition, extremely rare, of Satires XIV, XV, XVI and XVII by Mathurin Régnier, “the greatest satirical poet of the era” (Pascal Debailly).

“This fourth original edition is augmented with Satires xiv, xv, xvi, xvii, which appear here for the first time, and with nine bawdy pieces. It is very rare ” (Tchémerzine v-385) [Bibl. Nat. Res. Ye 7516].

In fact, the three original editions of Satyres by Regnier (1610 with x Satyres – 1612 with xiii Satyres and 1613 – the present edition with xvii Satyres) are of the utmost rarity. Among these three editions, in more than thirty years, we have catalogued only one copy of the 1608 edition, in modern binding, described as follows by the bibliographer “Le Petit”:

“This edition of Régnier is of the greatest rarity. It contains only one Discourse to the King and ten satires (Satyres I to IX; plus the XIIth). Beyond the literary interest presented by this original edition from one of our most lively satirists, it may be considered a first-rate ‘bibliophilic’ curiosity. We do not know of another copy in private libraries except the one found, among many other treasures of the same kind, in the collection of Baron de Ruble. The Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal has a copy.

We find no trace of this book in any recent public sale. What is certain is that it is of very great value.”

“Mathurin Régnier is not only the greatest satirical poet of the early 17th century, he embodies as no other the spirit of classical satire in verse, even in the eyes of Boileau, who would modestly claim to be his disciple. He was born in Chartres in 1573, while the Wars of Religion were raging. His father Jacques Régnier became alderman in 1595. His mother Simone Desportes was the sister of the famous Philippe Desportes, who was to play a decisive role in his career. Desportes taught the young man the basics of the poetic craft and never ceased to offer him advice and encouragement. At the time of the struggle against Malherbe, Régnier would proudly declare: “I follow the broad path my uncle showed me” (Sat. IX, v 96). Mathurin was tonsured in 1582. Then, thanks to Desportes, he entered the service of Cardinal François de Joyeuse, who was appointed in 1587 protector of French affairs in Rome. Régnier won the friendship of influential patrons like Adrien de Montluc, Count of Caramain, through whom he may have been introduced to the subversive ideas of Giulio Cesare Vanini. He also associated with Baron de Fourquevaux, who belonged to the household of Queen Marguerite, the painter Martin Fréminet, and Philippe de Béthune, brother of the minister Sully, whom he met in Rome.

Régnier eventually left his cardinal, probably in 1605. From then on, he settled in the Paris region. He frequented the sumptuous house of his uncle Desportes in Vanves, whose poetic authority was strongly questioned by François de Malherbe. Invited to Vanves around the end of 1605, Malherbe offended Desportes by declaring he preferred his soup to his Psalms. Régnier was tasked by his uncle to avenge the insult: he lashed out and wrote the splendid Satyre IX, followed by Satyre X, which organized the resistance of the disciples of Ronsard and Desportes against Malherbe and his new school.

The collection of Satyres he published in 1608 propelled Régnier to the rank of leader of the Ronsardians, but also of the most impertinent comic poets of the era. Valued by King Henry IV, Régnier also sought the protection of the poet Jean Bertault, the very young Abbot of Beaulieu, son of the Marshal of France, Jean de Lavardin, and especially of the Marquis de Cœuvres, one of the King’s intimates. Cœuvres recruited our poet to write elegies intended to serve the loves of the Vert-Galant. Thanks to him, Régnier obtained from the king a pension of five thousand livres. He then became a sort of official poet.

He spent the end of his life mostly at the Abbey of Royaumont, among the circle of Philippe Hurault de Cheverny. It was there, no doubt, that he wrote Macette, Satyre XIII, and his last works. But he fell gravely ill. He gave up satire and started composing moving Spiritual Poems. He died on October 16, 1613.

As a poet, Mathurin Régnier achieved one of the objectives of the Defence and Illustration, the creation in the French language of a classical verse satire modeled on the works of Horace, Persius, and Juvenal.

Régnier’s success is that he knew how to create a poetic space where, using the commonplaces of moral reflection, he could give free rein to his taste for candor and freedom. He developed an aesthetic of humor, nonchalance, and whimsy, which he put at the service of friendship, but also saw as an instrument of individual emancipation in the libertine sense. If not presenting a wisdom, he presents a temperament, making the poem a place and ferment of humor and pleasure. This vital and vibrant impulse characterizes his comic verve. His realism lies in being, before Baudelaire, a poet of the city, immersing us in the gentle din of social comedy. If we do not know where, Régnier is “a force in motion”: man at least has the power to oppose the absurdity of existence with the energy of his humor and the pride of his indolence. Like the greatest satirists, Régnier is a poet of the present, one who constantly runs against us, but merges with the movement and outpouring of the days” (Pascal Debailly).

Precious volume preserved in its original binding with repeated heraldic arms five times attributable to Jean-Baptiste de Verthamon (1646-1735), lord of Pamiers.

James de Rothschild owned 4 editions of Régnier’s Satyres (Paris, 1614; Rouen 1614; Paris, 1617; and Leyden 1642) but was never able to acquire the three original editions of 1608, 1612, and 1613.