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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 345.440263
EAN: 9780674766914
ISBN: 0674766911
Label: Harvard University Press
Manufacturer: Harvard University Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 176
Publication Date: 1984-07
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Studio: Harvard University Press

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Editorial Review:

Product Description:


The Inventive Peasant Arnaud du Tilh had almost persuaded the learned judges at the Parlement of Toulouse, when on a summer's day in 1560 a man swaggered into the court on a wooden leg, denounced Arnaud, and reestablished his claim to the identity, property, and wife of Martin Guerre. The astonishing case captured the imagination of the Continent. Told and retold over the centuries, the story of Martin Guerre became a legend, still remembered in the Pyrenean village where the impostor was executed more than 400 years ago.



Now a noted historian, who served as consultant for a new French film on Martin Guerre, has searched archives and lawbooks to add new dimensions to a tale already abundant in mysteries: we are led to ponder how a common man could become an impostor in the sixteenth century, why Bertrande de Rols, an honorable peasant woman, would accept such a man as her husband, and why lawyers, poets, and men of letters like Montaigne became so fascinated with the episode.



Natalie Zemon Davis reconstructs the lives of ordinary people, in a sparkling way that reveals the hidden attachments and sensibilities of nonliterate sixteenth-century villagers. Here we see men and women trying to fashion their identities within a world of traditional ideas about property and family and of changing ideas about religion. We learn what happens when common people get involved in the workings of the criminal courts in the ancien régime, and how judges struggle to decide who a man was in the days before fingerprints and photographs. We sense the secret affinity between the eloquent men of law and the honey-tongued village impostor, a rare identification across class lines.



Deftly written to please both the general public and specialists, The Return of Martin Guerre will interest those who want to know more about ordinary families and especially women of the past, and about the creation of literary legends. It is also a remarkable psychological narrative about where self-fashioning stops and lying begins.






Rating: - Intriguing and well researched
This companion volume to the film (it was written as that, expressly) can be read and enjoyed by someone who's never seen that film. That would be me, as it happens.

A 16th Century peasant named Martin Guerre abandons his wife and child, and disappears from his home area completely for many years. When a man arrives in their village claiming to be the long absent Martin, and knowing details about his life there, his family decides that the physical differences they see must be due to ... Read More

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Rating: - The Return of Martin Guerre
The Return of Martin Guerre is a great book because it is very well reserched and is a very easy read for people who are not familar with the history of France. At times the book becomes dry but overall it is a wonderfully compelling story. The story of Martin Guerre seems almost unreal if it did not have historical proof behind it. The story sounds like something out of a hollywood movie which makes the story very compelling. The movie of the same title is great but read the book before seeing the ... Read More

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Rating: - Stellar historical novel!
This is a well-written and well-researched historical work. The book needs all the requirements for academic writing, yet actually manages to be readable! Shocking thought, right? This is definitely worth the time to read! As a note there is a movie version, in French, that is actually quite well done (Davis consulted on it) and knock off US version set in the Civil War (Sommersby), which sucks.

Davis explores the trial of Martin Guerre in medieval France. Guerre runs off to war ... Read More

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Rating: - Great "Micro- History," a new genre in history
At first, Natalie Davis collaborated with the director Daniel Vigne on his film, but she became dissatisfied by how many elements of the story never made it into the movie. Her book adds specific details she thought central to the story; such as, the Guerre's Basque roots, Bertrande first meeting Arnaud du Tilh at an inn outside of the village, and Bertrande's reasons for collaborating with the imposter. Davis' story affords her audience a rare glimpse into the world of peasant life in sixteenth century ... Read More

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Rating: - History With Academic Rigour and Real Literary Worth

The Return of Martin Guerre is not a regular history book. It is extremely short and extremely readable: a tale of intrigue; muddled and contradictory motivations; ethnic assimilation, sexual deficiencies; witch craft; and the stolen identity of a peasant by another on the backdrop of the Protestant reformation in France, Natalie Z. Davis's account of this utterly weird case of sixteenth century fraud proves the old dictum that historians never tire of explaining to incredulous novelists and an unfortunately ... Read More

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