Everything about Jean-antoine De Ba F totally explained
Jean Antoine de Baïf (
February 19,
1532 -
September 19,
1589) was a
French poet and member of the
Pléiade.
Life
He was born in
Venice, the natural son of the scholar
Lazare de Baïf, who was at that time French ambassador at Venice. Thanks, perhaps, to the surroundings of his childhood, he grew up an enthusiast for the
fine arts, and surpassed in zeal all the leaders of the
Renaissance in France. His father spared no pains to secure the best possible education for his son. The boy was taught
Latin by
Charles Estienne, and
Greek by
Ange Vergèce, the
Cretan scholar and
calligraphist who designed Greek types for
Francis I.
When he was eleven years old he was put under the care of the famous
Jean Daurat.
Ronsard, who was eight years his senior, now began to share his studies.
Claude Binet tells how young Baïf, bred on Latin and Greek, smoothed out the tiresome beginnings of the Greek language for Ronsard, who in return initiated his companion into the mysteries of French versification.
Baïf possessed an extraordinary facility, and the mass of his work has injured his reputation. Besides a number of volumes of short poems of an amorous or congratulatory kind, he translated or paraphrased various pieces from
Bion,
Moschus,
Theocritus,
Anacreon,
Catullus and
Martial. He resided in
Paris, and enjoyed the continued favor of the court. In
1570, in conjunction with the composer
Joachim Thibault de Courville, with royal blessing and financial backing, he founded the
Académie de musique et de poésie, with the idea of establishing a closer union between music and poetry; his house became famous for the concerts which he gave, entertainments which
Charles IX and
Henry III frequently attended. Composers such as
Claude Le Jeune, who was to become the most influential musician in France in the late
16th century, and
Jacques Mauduit, who carried the Academie's ideas into the
17th century, soon joined the group, which remained secretive as to its intents and techniques.
Works
Baïf elaborated a system for regulating French versification by quantity, a system which came to be known as
vers mesurés, or
vers mesurés à l'antique. In the general idea of regulating versification by quantity, he wasn't a pioneer.
Jacques de la Taille had written in
1562 the
Maniére de faire des vers en français comme en grec et en Latin (printed 1573), and other poets had made experiments in the same direction; however, in his specific attempt to recapture the ancient Greek and Latin ethical effect of poetry on its hearers, and in applying the metrical innovations to music, he created something entirely new.
Baïf's innovations also included a line of 15 syllables known as the
vers Baïfin. He also meditated reforms in French spelling.
His theories are exemplified in
Etrenes de poezie Franzoeze an vers mezures (1574). His works were published in 4 volumes, entitled
Œuvres en rime (1573), consisting of
Amours, Jeux, Passetemps, et Poemes, containing, among much that's now hardly readable, some pieces of infinite grace and delicacy. His
sonnet on the
Roman de la Rose was said to contain the whole argument of that celebrated work, and
Colletet says it was on everybody's lips.
He also wrote a celebrated sonnet in praise of the
St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre. Baïf was the author of two comedies,
L'Eunuque, 1565 (published 1573), a free translation of
Terence's
Eunuchus, and
Le Brave (1567), an imitation of the
Miles Gloriosus, in which the characters of
Plautus are turned into Frenchmen, the action taking place at
Orléans. Baïf published a collection of Latin verse in 1577, and in 1576 a popular volume of
Mimes, enseignemens et proverbes.
Further Information
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