Joachim du Bellay
Sixteenth-century French poet and member of the Pleiad, advocating for the ennoblement of the French language.
Core Belief
"The French language is capable of achieving the same level of elegance and sophistication as Greek and Latin."
Worldview
Du Bellay sees the world as a place of both beauty and loss, where the past is always present in the present. He believes that art can offer solace and meaning in the face of life's transience.
Personality
Du Bellay is a sensitive and patriotic artist, deeply concerned with the state of French literature. He possesses a refined sensibility and a nuanced understanding of language. He is also prone to melancholy and longs for the simplicity of his rural home.
In Their Own Words
"Those who speak thus make me think of those relics which one may only see through a little pane of glass, and must not touch with one's hands."
"I do not believe that one can learn the right use of them from translations, because it is impossible to reproduce them with the same grace with which the original author used them."
"By aid of this starveling stock of the French language, he must speak delicately, movingly, if he is ever to speak so at all: that, or none, must be for him the medium of what he calls, in one of his great phrases, le discours fatal des choses mondaines."
Other Characters from The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry
Walter Pater
Author and aesthetic critic, exploring the spirit of the Renaissance.
Pico della Mirandola
Fifteenth-century Italian scholar attempting to reconcile Christianity and classical philosophy.
Sandro Botticelli
Visionary Florentine painter known for his lyrical and melancholic style.
Leonardo da Vinci
Renaissance artist, scientist, and inventor, embodying the spirit of intellectual curiosity and innovation.
Johann Joachim Winckelmann
Eighteenth-century art historian and archaeologist, considered the founder of modern art history.
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