Shakespeare’s Connection With Chinon

Rabelais Statue, Chinon.

It will come as a revelation to many (me) but not to Shakespeare scholars that the genius story-teller from Stratford-on-Avon was a huge fan of Rabelais the genius storyteller from Chinon-sur-Vienne and that the inspiration for some of his crude, comic characters came from the crude, comic characters created by Rabelais seventy years earlier.

Forteresse Royale de Chinon

Rabelais. The great, the magnificent, the vulgar and, frankly, obscene satirist is revered all over The Loire Valley. Universities, confraternities, colleges, schools, streets, squares, hotels, markets and restaurants are all named in his honour.

Aspects of his laugh out loud potty mouth characters were given new life by Shakespeare.

Rabelais’ grotesque giant Gargantua was his model for the gluttonous boozer Falstaff.

Rabelais: Do What You Will, was above the gate of his (fictitious) Abbey.

Twelfth Night is subtitled or What You Will. In the play, Sir Andrew Aguecheek’s gibberish mirrors that of Rabelais’ Lord Kissbreech.

As You Like It. Rosalind: ‘What did he when thou sawest him? What said he? How looked he? Wherein went he? What makes him here? Did he ask for me? Where remains he? How parted he with thee? and when shalt thou see him again? Answer me in one word.’.

Celia: ‘You must borrow me Gargantua's mouth first: 'tis a word too great for any mouth of this age's size’.

Rabelais: ...’These two did often times do the two backed beast together, joyfully rubbing & frotting their Bacon ’gainst one another’.

Othello, Iago: ‘your daughter and the Moor are now making the beast with two backs’.

Rabelais: ‘All the Legions of Devils hold here … or else Madam Proserpine is in Child's labour’…Rabelais’ shipwreck described the phenomenon of St. Elmo’s Fire long before Shakespeare (during fierce storms sailors often saw sparkling lights dance around the masts caused by the air becoming highly ionized from lightning).

The Tempest: The main character is Prospero. ‘Hell is empty, And all the devils are here’. Ariel: ‘...on the deck, in every cabin, I flamed amazement...I flame distinctly ...The fire, and cracks Of sulphurous roaring…’

Thubal Holofernes is Gargantua’s tutor.

Love's Labour's Lost has a character called Thubal Holofernes.

It’s thanks to Francis I and his sister Marguerite, Shakespeare had copies of Rabelais’ books. The Sorbonne wanted to burn them. Prevented from burning them it banned them instead. Francis insisted Rabelais be allowed to publish.

Marguerite befriended Rabelais who encouraged her to write. When she did, the King had another run in with the Sorbonne. He was furious when she was accused of being a heretic and her books were also banned (it said she should be tied in a sack and thrown in the Seine).

When Rabelais was forced to lie low, also accused of heresy, he wrote under the pseudonym Alcofribas Nasier (anagram of François Rabelais). Francis saved his bacon by appointing him Master of Requests to the royal court.

Liberal, open minded Francis and Marguerite were brought up in Château Amboise by their mother who employed enlightened tutors. For many many years, the King’s much loved boyhood home was his main residence.

Rue Rabelais, Amboise

So. Was Shakespeare a plagiarist? No. Isaac Newton: ‘If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants’. Jonathan Swift and James Joyce also ‘borrowed’ from Rabelais. Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy, if not exactly a rip off, owes a huge debt to him. It became a phenomenon because so few had read Rabelais.

Besides, it turns out that Rabelais was not averse to borrowing. Desperate for money, when he read the best seller The Grand and Priceless Chronicles of the Great and Enormous Giant Gargantua he decided to write a sequel The Very Horrific Life of the Great Gargantua, Father of Pantagruel.

Stories by this ribald, bawdy, lewd, lovable, genius are an absolute tonic. The hilarious characters dreamed up by the rambunctious, irreverent monk are, quite simply, unforgettable.

As he says in his introduction to Gargantua and Pantagruel, ‘Laughter is man’s proper lot’.

Post by Pamela, photography by Mark.