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In This Article Guillaume de Machaut

  • Introduction
  • Reference Works
  • Lyrical Poetry
  • Editions
  • Works Inaccurate in the Musical Editions
  • Manuscript Studies
  • Images of Machaut Manuscripts
  • Art Historical Studies
  • Biography
  • Literary and Musical Legacy
  • Machaut and Chaucer
  • Machaut Reception in Modern Times
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Music Guillaume de Machaut
by
Lawrence Earp

Introduction

Guillaume de Machaut (b. c. 1300–d. 1377) was the leading poet and composer of the period from about 1340 to 1375 in France. He may be regarded as the culminating figure in the tradition of the cleric poet-musician, a professional proficient with the most subtle and complex forms of poetry as well as music, whose works served the amusement and edification of the aristocratic court. Machaut cultivated an enormously broad spectrum of genres: narrative poetry, lyrical poetry (some of it set to music), hybrid narratives (incorporating lyrics, music, and even prose letters), long and complex lyric lais (most with music), intricate motets that interlock textual and musical planes, a polyphonic setting of the Mass ordinary, a textless hocket, and numerous polyphonic songs in the fixed forms: ballade, rondeau, and virelai. Some of these genres served to consolidate new directions established earlier in the 14th century; others founded new directions that remained points of departure for more than a hundred years. In addition, many of the manuscript sources, which transmit Machaut’s works exclusively, are masterpieces of the art of late medieval book illumination. Because of the diversity of Machaut’s achievement, readers may come to this bibliography with very different needs in mind. While for the sake of convenience the aspects of poetry, art, and music have been separated, readers are encouraged to range widely, for the different disciplines cumulate their effects in Machaut, and after all, broad reception and accessibility—of course, always within the restricted bounds of an elite courtly culture—was his artistic goal.

General Overviews

Scholarship on Machaut is largely split between specialists in literary matters and specialists in musical matters. The general overviews are subdivided accordingly, although Machaut, as a figure equally adept in both areas, is best served by an interdisciplinary approach.

LAST MODIFIED: 06/29/2011

DOI: 10.1093/OBO/9780199757824-0030

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