Alegret

Alegret was a Gascon troubadour, one of the earliest lyric satirists in the Occitan tongue, and a contemporary of Marcabru (fl. c. 1145).Léglu, 48.] One "sirventes" and one "canso" survive of his poems. Nonetheless, his reputation was high enough that he found his way into the poetry of Bernart de Ventadorn and Raimbaut d'Aurenga.Gaunt and Kay, 279.] The work of Alegret is also intertextually and stylistically related to that of Peire d'Alvernhe.

Alegret was also one of the first troubadours to employ the feudal metaphor to describe courtly love. He describes his relationship to his "domna" (lady) as that of vassalage by calling himself her "endomenjatz" (basically, vassal or liegeman).Paterson, 31.] Pelligrini saw this passage as imitating Bernart de Ventadorn, considered the master of this metaphor:Marcabru parodied the structure of Alegret's "Ara pareisson li'aubre sec" in his own poem "Bel m'es quan la rana chanta".Gaunt, "Did Marcabru Know the Tristan Legend?", 110.] In his typically moralising tone he accuses of Alegret of being a flatterer who cuckolds his lord. Alegret is implicitly compared to the Tristan of legend for he wears "la blancha camiza" (the white shirt symbolising a sexual relationship). In his own work Alegret criticses "marritz drutz" (faithless husbands), but primarily, like Cercamon, because they encourage promiscuity in women.Gaunt, "Marginal men, Marcabru and orthodoxy: the early troubadours and adultery", 65.]

Works in translation

* [http://colecizj.easyvserver.com/poaleais.htm "Aissi cum selh qu'es vencutz" ("Just as the one who's beat")] , translated by James H. Donalson (2005)
* [http://colecizj.easyvserver.com/poaleara.htm "Ara pareisson ll'aubre sec" ("Now all the trees appear dried up")] , translated by James H. Donalson (2005)

Notes

ources

*Gaunt, Simon, and Kay, Sarah. "Appendix I: Major Troubadours" (pp. 279–291). The Troubadours: An Introduction. Simon Gaunt and Sarah Kay, edd. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 0 521 57473 0.
*Gaunt, Simon B. "Did Marcabru Know the Tristan Legend?". "Medium aevum", 55 (1986) pp. 108–113.
*Gaunt, Simon B. "Marginal men, Marcabru and orthodoxy: the early troubadours and adultery". "Medium aevum", 59 (1990) pp. 55–72.
*Léglu, Catherine. "Moral and satirical poetry". The Troubadours: An Introduction. Simon Gaunt and Sarah Kay, edd. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 0 521 57473 0.
*Paterson, Linda M. "The World of the Troubadours: Medieval Occitan Society, c. 1100–c. 1300". Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0 521 55832 8.
*Van Vleck, Amelia E. [http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft358004pc/ "Memory and Re-Creation in Troubadour Lyric".] Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991.