“A devout and holy sermon”: sources of parody in sermons joyeux

Abstract

The sermon joyeux is a polemical and frivolous genre of late medieval French literature that parodies religious sermons. These humorous writings in verse transcended the canons of propriety and soon gained popularity across Europe, surviving even after the Middle Ages. This article, concentrating on the sermons joyeux that represent the lives of false saints, analyses three main sources of parody for this subgroup of the genre: the comic tradition of ecclesiastical parody in general, liturgical parody, and hagiographical parody. The study outlines a general landscape of the comic tradition in which sermons joyeux were created, highlighting some probable precursors to the genre with the goal of describing the characteristic features of these parodies. The analysis of the examples from the sermons joyeux themselves illuminates the reasons for the mock sermons’ popularity among and beyond clerical audiences and demonstrates how these texts may be perceived as significant of the importance, recognition and interest towards religious life rather than criticism or utilitarian didacticism.