Kenneth Varty

Although Reynard the Fox didn't officially arrive in England until 1481, when William Caxton printed his The History of Reynard the Fox, translated from Gheraert Leeu's 1479 Dutch prose work, Die Hystorie van Rayaert die Vos, scholar Kenneth Varty here explores the iconographic evidence for a Reynardian fox lore that existed in England before that time. Certainly, episodes from the Reynard cycle had been included in works of English literature prior to Caxton - most notably, in The Nun's show more Priest's Tale of the Cock and the Fox episode of The Canterbury Tales - although the characters were never named, but Varty's work is concerned with the visual arts: sculpture, book illustration, painting, and other media. Chapters are devoted to the depiction of the fox and the cock, the fox-preacher and religious, the trial of the fox for adultery and rape, the fox's death and resurrection, the fox and the wolf in the well, the fox-devil, the fox-physician and the lion-patient, the fox and the ape, the fabulists' fox, the fox's triumph, and the use of Wynkyn de Worde's picture cycle in various editions and adaptations over the years. The book also includes three appendixes, respectively containing: a list of drawings and paintings of foxes in manuscripts kept in Britain, a list of carvings and paintings of foxes in buildings, and a list of all illustrated Histories of Reynard the Fox from Wynkyn de Worde (c. 1495) to A Soulby (c. 1800) kept in UK libraries...

Like Reynard the Fox: Social Engagement and Cultural Metamorphoses in the Beast Epic from the Middle Ages to the Present, a collection of essays which Varty edited, I read Reynard, Renart, Reinaert and Other Foxes in Medieval England: The Iconographic Evidence for my masters dissertation on the evolution of the Reynard story through three centuries of Anglophone children's literature. With the exception of two essays - one on carved choir-stall depictions of Reynard, written by Varty himself, together with Elaine C. Block, and the other on the Reineke cartoons of Paul Weber - that other title mostly concerned itself with literary analysis of one kind or another. Here the focus is on the visual depiction of Reynard, and the results are fascinating. It is quite evident that the English were well aware of the Reynard story, long before it officially reached their shores, in the form of an English translation. Although it was all of interest - and I particularly appreciated the fact that the book provides a detailed resource for scholars interested in tracking down the original sources/artwork for themselves - for the purposes of my own research, the final chapter on Wynken de Worde, as well as the related appendix, were the most useful, as illustrated texts were often considered the most suitable for child readers. The Wynken de Worde woodcut illustrations, first produced for the 1495 edition of the Caxton, would go on to be used in at least forty different editions and retellings of Reynard, from that first edition through 1800, and Varty tracks that history in his chapter. He also discusses the Reynardian depictions of Wilhelm von Kaulbach, the German artist whose illustrations for Goethe's Reineke Fuchs were much heralded and reprinted, first appearing in English in 1851, in The Comical Creatures from Wurtemberg.

All in all, this was an excellent work, one I would highly recommend to all readers interested in Reynardian lore in general, and artistic depictions of that lore in particular. show less

This collection of fifteen essays, each concerned with some aspect of the Reynard story in Europe, was one of the primary critical and historical sources I used, when writing my masters dissertation on three centuries of Reynard retellings for children in the Anglophone world. Edited by Kenneth Varty, who was also the author or co-author of five of the essays, it sets out a history of the transmission of the Reynard story in the introduction, and then delves into specific topics in each show more essay, from the satiric nature of the 12th-century poem, the Ysengrimus, which marked Reynard's first appearance as a named character, to the relationship of the fox and the hare in these stories. In between are essays offering: an analysis of rape and adultery in the French Roman de Renart; a look at the moral and political vision of the Alsatian Heinrich der Glichezaere's Reinhart Fuchs; a comparison of the medieval French and Dutch tradition; a history of Dutch printing of Reynaert, from the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries; an examination of the use of the figure of Reynaert as a Flemish national symbol in the 19th century; a history of the evolution of the episode in which the tom-cat castrates the priest, over time; a look at medieval carvings of Reynard on choir-stalls, and their didactic purpose; a history of Reynard in England, from Caxton to the present; an analysis of Hartmann Schopper's 1567 Latin Reinike; an examination of Goethe's Reineke Fuchs; an analysis of Paul Weber's Reineke cartoons; the varying presence of the Roman de Renart through history; and an analysis of the episode of the fox and the wolf in the well.

Although not all of the essays here were particularly germane to my own area of interest, when it comes to Reynard Studies, they were all fascinating. This story, which concerns the rivalry between a fox and a wolf courtier in the court of a lion king, is of great antiquity, stretching all the way back to Mesopotamian literature. That said, Reynard first made his named appearance around 1149 in Ghent, in the Latin poem Ysengrimus, where he was known as Reinardus. He first appeared in France in the 1170s, and was initially known as "Renart le goupil." Such was the linguistic influence of Le Roman de Renart, that his name became synonymous with the fox, even to the point that the previous French word for fox, "goupil," fell out of favor, and was largely replaced by "renard." Fascinating stuff! It is also interesting to note that before Reynard's full history appeared for the first time in English, thanks to the work of William Caxton, whose 1481 The History of Reynard the Fox was one of the first printed books in that language, an episode from his story was included in The Cantebury Tales. The Middle English poem, The Fox and the Wolf, also presents an episode from Reynard, although the characters are not named. There are so many connections between Reynard's story, and other works of European literature, and so many connections between the various major European traditions regarding him - the Dutch, French, German, Flemish, English, and so on - that I am sometimes surprised at how few people I know have even heard of him, or are aware of his significance, not just in the world of adult letters, but in the pages of children's literature as well. After all, when Locke wrote his Some Thoughts Concerning Education in 1693, he opined that the History of Reynard was one of the few things then available that was suitable for children to read, and many early children's books, whether for pleasure reading or educational purposes, included his story.

This is a collection I would recommend to any Reynard fans, and any reader interested in the history of the Reynard story. For general readers not yet familiar with Reynard, I would simply recommend seeking out some of the various tellings of his history. show less

Struck by the richness of medieval animal epic on the Continent and its paucity in England until Caxton's translation from the Dutch, the author went in search of iconographic evidence of that epic in pre-Caxton England. His findings constitute a new study of the illustration of English fox lore and Reynard the Fox stories during the Middle Ages. The book also includes a brief survey of developments in post-medieval times.

It emerges that the fictional foxes of England may have descended from show more French Renarts, who later assimilated traits of Dutch Reinaerts. With over 250 illustrations, many of recently discovered material, the book is divided into sections dealing with typical episodes (e.g. the fox's trial for rape, his "death" and "resurrection") as well as the ongoing fortunes of Wynkyn de Worde's 1495 cycle of woodcuts, which were clearly inspired by those of the Haarlem Master. show less