False Starts and Ambiguous Clues in François Villon's Testament (1461)

Summary

In the course of his brief life (c.1431-after 1463), the lyric poet François Villon seemingly led multiple existences and intensely re-lived several of them in his memory. His body of work is modest, comprising under 3,000 lines; in quality his poetry is uneven yet at its best unforgettable; and this circumstance justifies the oft-reiterated judgment that the poet is the outstanding French lyricist of the Middle Ages. Consequently, the body of editions and of secondary literature inspired by him is enormous. This essay addresses one feature of his major work, the Testament, from a perspective occasionally touched on but not, as far as I know, thoroughly explored: his literary self and that persona's complex dialectic with the reader.

When Villon undertakes to write his semi-fictional, pseudo-autobiographical Testament, he seems to play cat and mouse with his prospective audience for a considerable length of time, not naming the project under way until vv. 78–80; here we learn that: “J'ay ce testament tres estable / Fait, de derreniere voulenté, / Seul pour tout et inrevocable.” Instead of continuing, he then starts briskly at the very beginning of the work with his first eightline stanza (huitain), which offers the sort of data and the juridical style (non obstant, lesquelles [vv. 4–5 — notwithstanding, which]) common to all contemporary wills. However, these verses at once alert readers to the fact that what is being offered is a spurious legal document.