Roman de la Rose

The Roman de la Rose (French: [ʁɔmɑ̃ də la ʁoz]; "Romance of the Rose"), is a medieval French poem styled as an allegorical dream vision. It is a notable instance of courtly literature. The work's stated purpose is to both entertain and to teach others about the Art of Love. At various times in the poem, the "Rose" of the title is seen as the name of the lady, and as a symbol of female sexuality in general. Likewise, the other characters' names function both as regular names and as abstractions illustrating the various factors that are involved in a love affair.

The poem was written in two stages. The first 4058 lines, written by Guillaume de Lorris circa 1230, describe the attempts of a courtier to woo his beloved. This part of the story is set in a walled garden or locus amoenus, one of the traditional topoi of epic and chivalric literature. Around 1275, Jean de Meun composed an additional 17,724 lines. In this enormous coda, allegorical personages (Reason, Genius, and so on) hold forth on love.

The work was both popular and controversial—one of the most widely read works in France for three centuries, and possibly the most read book in Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries. Its emphasis on sensual language and imagery provoked attacks by Jean Gerson, Christine de Pizan and many other writers and moralists of the 14th and 15th centuries. Historian Johan Huizinga writes: "It is astonishing that the Church, which so rigorously repressed the slightest deviations from dogma of a speculative character, suffered the teaching of this breviary of the aristocracy (for the Roman de la Rose was nothing else) to be disseminated with impunity."

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