Aspects of the Psychology of Love in the Heptameron

Author(s): Mary J. Baker

Source: The Sixteenth Century Journal, Vol. 19, No. 1 (Spring, 1988), pp. 81-87
Published by: The Sixteenth Century Journal
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Sixteenth Century Journal

XIX, No. 1 (1988)

Aspects of the Psychology of Love

in the Heptame'ron
MaryJ. Baker
The University of Texas at Austin
has focused on
Criticismof the "perfectlove" stories in the Heptameron
the misery and frustrationof lovers who, unfulfilledin love, may flee to
a monasteryor even die. There is general agreementthat the events in
these stories are at variancewith the neoplatonicphilosophy of love, aspects of which are expressed in the Heptamfron.Although no coherent
philosophy can be identified in the Heptamfron,the three tales under
considerationdo exemplifya coherentpsychology, one with close parallels to Freudianthought on the dualismof the instinctsand the function
of religion and art.
VARIOUSCRITICSHAVENOTEDTHATTHESTORIESin Margueritede

Navar-

re's Heptameronthat treat the subject of perfect love (la parfaicteamour)

show us lovers who are miserable and frustrated, who may flee to a
monastery to escape their unhappiness, or who may even die.' In this
connection, Philippe de Lajarte argues persuasively that the neoplatonic
philosophy of love, aspects of which are expressed in the Heptameron,is
at variance with the events of the stories themselves, the movement
from human to divine love being the result of the failure of human love:
"la conversion de l'amour humain en amour divin y est la consequence
d'un echec de l'amour humain" (p. 345). He concludes that "l'Heptame'ron
ne saurait relever d'une quelconque lecture ideologique" (p. 370). While
in complete agreement with this assertion that one cannot identify a single coherent philosophy in the HeptameronI should like to argue that in
these stories of conversion to divine love, there is a very coherent psychology.
Lajarte includes in his discussion nos. 10, 40, 70, 19, 24, and 64. I
should like to narrow this study to nos. 19, 24, and 64 because they [ieveal the most explicit depiction of the conversion of human love to divine love. Numbers 10, 40, and 70 do not disprove my thesis of the psychological coherence of stories involving conversion to divine love, but
'See, for example, Donald Stone, "Narrative Technique in l'Heptameron,"Studi Francesi
et le ficinisme: Rapports d'un texte
11 (1967): 473-76; Philippe de Lajarte, "L'Heptame'ron
et d'une ideologie," Revue des Sciences Humaines 37, no. 147 (Juillet-Septembre 1972):
339-71; Robert W. Bernard, "Platonism-Myth or Reality in the Heptameron?"Sixteenth
de Marguerite de
Century Journal 5 (April 1974): 3-14; and Nicole Cazauran, L'Heptame'ron
Navarre (Paris: Societe d'Enseignement Superieur, 1976), 234-55.

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they raise, from the start, other important issues; for example, Amadour's virtue or lack thereof in no. 10,2 the Comte de Jossebelin's right to
decide whom his sister marries in no. 40, the obligations and rights of
husband, wife, servant, suitor, and mistress in no. 70. On the other
hand, tale nos. 19, 24, and 64 all focus on the unconsummated love of
unmarried couples and they have several important motifs in common.
One or the other of the frustrated parties writes a poem during the
course of the relationship.3 A thwarted lover either enters a monastery
or becomes a hermit. And finally, this same lover dies or is obsessed
with death. These various manifestations of disappointed love exemplify Freud's analysis of the dualism of the instincts, and his analysis of the
function of religion and art.4 Marguerite does not ultimately reveal, as
Donald Stone suggests, an ideal of conduct that is "ahuman" (p. 476),
but rather depicts behavior that is profoundly human.
Seen within a Freudian framework, the three stories under consideration constitute different stages in the renunciation of the life instincts,
with no. 19 revealing most clearly the Freudian paradox of the simultaneous abandonment and fulfillment of desire. I shall begin with a discussion of no. 64, which illustrates the least successful renunciation of the
life instincts.
In this tale,5 a gentleman from Valencia loves a lady "parfaictement", but is rejected by her for marriage. He "copes" with this disappointment by becoming a Cordelier. In Freudian psychology,6 religion is
a neurosis which "seems to be based on the suppression, the renunciation, of certain instinctual impulses."7 Man turns to religion (as well as
to other escapes) because life is difficult, painful, and full of disappointment.8 But the gentleman does not find consolation in religion. Failing
to achieve the happy life he hoped for, he chooses the most unpleasant
2See M. J. Baker, "Didacticism and the Heptame'ron:The Misinterpretation of the Tenth
Tale as an Exemplum," French Review 45 (1971-72), Special Issue 3, 84-90.
3Poems are found in only four of the stories in the Heptame'ron.All the poems occur in
the context of lack of fulfillment in love. Tale no. 13 differs from the other three, however,
in that the "perfect" lover is married, and he does not turn to divine love.
4Freudian thought has of course been challenged over the years. But whether there is
an innate death wish, as Freud claims, or whether such a wish is the result of individual
stress or cultural influences, there is general agreement that a desire for death does exist.
Theorists also generally agree that one function of art can be to sublimate the writer's
neuroses, and that religion is often used as an escape from various problems, including
sexual repression.
5Page references to the Heptame'ronwill be indicated in parentheses following the allusions or quotations. The edition is that of Michel Franqois (Paris: Garnier, 1964).
6A11quotations from Freud are taken from Sigmund Freud, The StandardEdition of the
CompletePsychological Works, 24. vols., ed. James Strachey, trans., James Strachey, Anna
Freud, Alix Strachey, and Alan Tyson, (London: Hogarth Press, 1953-74), hereafter cited
S.E. followed by vol. no. and p. no.
7"Obsessive Acts and Religious Practices," S.E. 9: 125.
8"Civilization and its Discontents," S.E. 21: 75.

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Psychology of Love

83

alternative life possible, "la plus austere et desagreable qu'il pourroit

ymaginer" (p. 384). His response is a masochistic one. The masochist invites punishment on himself by acting against his own real interests and
by ruining his prospects in the real world.9 The gentleman invites this
punishment on himself when he enters the monastery. His masochism
can be explained as a suppression of an act of aggressiveness directed
against the person who has frustrated his happiness, in this case,
against the lady who has rejected him. This aggression turned on the
self is an expression of guilt. Thus we are not surprised to find the word
penitenceused to describe the gentleman's life as a Cordelier, the remedy
that he has chosen to enable him to forget his sorrow: "il ne peult
trouver remede que de choisir une vie si aspre, que la continuelle penitence luy faict oblier sa douleur . . ." (p. 385).
The gentleman never completely succeeds in repressing his sexual
instincts. When the lady comes to visit him in the monastery, and faints
with emotion at the sight of him, he, in turn, who needed help no less
urgently than she did ("qui n'avoit moins de besoing de secours"),
feigns unawareness of her passion (p. 386). Fearing that love will inflict
him with a new and more deadly wound (p. 386), he flees. Passion has
not been successfully sublimated in religion.
After the gentleman has entered the monastery, and the lady
realizes that her chance for the consummation of her love has eluded
her, she writes an epftrein which she expresses her desire to give herself
to him and to join him in marriage. The lady here conforms to the Freudian conception of the artist as someone who tries to "come to terms [in
his art] with the renunciation of instinctual satisfaction.",0 She attempts, but without success, to refuse that renunciation and to draw her
suitor back into the world of human love. The epftreillustrates that combination of past, present, and future times in art described by Freud,
where a current condition "which has been able to arouse one of the
subject's major wishes" is connected to the "memory of an earlier experience . . . in which this wish was fulfilled," which in turn is connected to a creation of a "situation relating to the future, which repre11 The current situation of separation
sents a fulfillment of the wish....
impels the lady to wish for her lover back. A memory of better times and
a future wish-fulfillment are also expressed: "Retourne doncq et veuille
t'amye croire,/ Resfreichissant la plaisante memoire/ Du temps passe,
par ung sainct mariage" (p. 385).

9"The Economic Problem of Masochism," S.E. 19: 169-70.

'0"Formulations on the Two Principles of Mental Functioning," S. E. 12: 224.
""Creative Writers and Day-dreaming," S. E. 9: 147.

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Finally, the obsession of both gentleman and lady with death reflects one pole of that opposition of the death instincts to the life instincts described by Freud. In Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Freud writes
that the sexual instincts "are the true life instincts. They operate against
the purpose of the other instincts, which leads, by reason of their function, to death; and this fact indicates that there is an opposition between
them and the other instincts....
When the gentleman cannot satisfy
his passion, he turns towards death. In the monastery, the thought of
death becomes his "souveraine consolation" (p. 494). Similarly, the
lady, in her poem, expresses the thought that if she cannot fulfill her
passion, she wishes for death: "Or doncques, amy, la vie de ma vie, /Lequel perdant, n'ay plus de vivre envie" (p. 385).
In tale no. 24, the turn away from human love is seen as a cruel loss;
however, Elisor's conversion to divine love represents a more successful
sublimation of the sexual instincts than that of the gentleman in no. 64.
When Elisor reveals his secret (and perfect) seven-year love to the
Queen, she tests his love by banishing him for another seven years, a
sentence described as a "cruel commandement" (p. 197). Elisor ultimately responds by becoming a hermit. A hermit's life is described by
Freud as a relatively thorough way of remedying one's unhappiness in
relationships with others. The choice to become a hermit is made when
reality is regarded "as the sole enemy and as the source of all suffering,
with which it is impossible to live, so that one must break off all relations
with it if one is to be in any way happy. The hermit turns his back on the
world and will have no truck with it.'"13
Elisor also responds in art: he sends the Queen a poem he has written. He takes that step described by Freud in which a new world is
created from which "the most unbearable features are eliminated and
replaced by others that are in conformity with one's own wishes."'14
Elisor describes a new reality, a reality in which love is miraculously fulfilled. He affirms that Time has revealed to him the worthlessness of her
beauty (which hid cruelty), and the true worth of God's love. What
makes his sublimation more successful than that of the gentleman in no.
64 is the more complete substitution of divine for human love. He now
has an "amour veritable" (p. 199) to which he owes his "service." Perfect love is no longer the love he felt for the Queen in the past, but the
enduring love of God: "Car l'autre amour parfaicte et pardurable / Me
joinct 'a luy d'un lien immuable" (p. 200). The greater success of this
sublimation is also suggested by the absence of a fantasy expressed in
future time; a fulfilled present is described, seen in opposition to a disappointed past.
the Pleasure Principle," S. E. 18: 40.
'3"Civilization," S. E. 9: 81.
'4"Civilization," S.E. 9: 81.
'2"Beyond

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Psychologyof Love

85

Near the end of the story, Marguerite's narrative betrays some ambivalence towards this move to religion. One reads that the Queen had
sustained an unrecoverable loss, "ce que tous les biens du monde ne
povoient recouvrer" (p. 200). The turn to divine love appears to be seen
as a regrettable denial of human love. Even though the relationship between Elisor and the Queen is not an ideal one, Elisor's rejection of love
does not come without a cost. In a curious passage near the beginning of
the story, the omniscient authorial narrator observes that Elisor's love
was an illness giving such pleasure that the only cure could be death"une malladye, donnant tel contantement que la guarison estoit la
mort" (p. 197). In point of fact, Elisor doesdie when he recovers from
love-God "le tira en paradis" (p. 200)-thus reminding us again of that
opposition between life and death instincts outlined by Freud.
Tale no. 19 shares the insights into the reasons for the conversion
from human to divine love given in tale nos. 64 and 24. The gentleman
suitor turns to the monastery because life is too hard for him. He is
denied the possibility of marriage with Poline; he must abandon his sexual aims with regard to her. An ambivalence towards the sincerity and
the virtue of the conversion is expressed in this story just as in the
others. The gardienat the monastery views the gentleman as having too
many good and noble qualities to be a Cordelier: "il avoit en luy toutes
les bonnes et honnestes vertuz que l'on eust sceu desirer en ung gentil
homme" (p. 146). The gentleman is referred to twice as a "pauvre serviteur" (p. 149). He too, like the lover in no. 64, is not completely successful in repressing his sexual instincts: When he hears Poline cough in
the church, he recognizes that sound better than the bells of his monastery (p. 149).
But despite these negative signs, the gentleman does achieve a relatively successful renunciation of sexual aims. The success of his sublimation is suggested first of all in the poem he sends to Poline. Again,
the poem is an attempt to come to terms with the renunciation of sexual
satisfaction. The special emphasis of the poem is on the future, or the
wish fulfillment stage. It illustrates Freud's notion that we never give up
anything, but simply exchange one thing for another.15 The gentleman
uses a vocabulary that would normally be applied to married love to
describe a love of God.16 The soul becomes God's bride. He writes:
"nostre ame / Est de Dieu amie et femme" (p. 147). Poline, when she
makes the same move to divine love, says to her former suitor that they
must put aside the body and accept Christ as their spouse: "Oblyons le
15"Actually, we can never give anything up; we only exchange one thing for another.
What appears to be a renunciation is really the formation of a substitute or surrogate."
"Creative Writers" S.E. 9: 145.
16We saw this on a smaller scale in no. 24.

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corps qui perit et tient du viel Adan, pour recepvoir et revestir celluy de
nostre espoux Jesus-Christ" (p. 150).17
Second, the gentleman and Poline both attain a certain happiness.
Although the renunciation of human love has involved suffering and
the acceptance of "unpleasure", it results ultimately in pleasure. When
Poline affirms her conversion to divine love, her former suitor weeps
with joy (p. 150). Poline herself leaves in great happiness (p. 150). Even
death does not have an unpleasurable connotation. The gentleman
alludes in his poem to both his and Poline's deaths, and invites her to
flee the world with him. This invitation hints at a greater joy to come, by
virtue of its reference to the phoenix and that mythical animal's association with immortality.18
Freud points out that the characteristic transformation of instincts
from the mobile cathectic energy to the quiescent cathexis does not
ultimately exclude pleasure. Unpleasure may occur along the way, but
"the transformation occurs on behalfof the pleasure principle; the binding is a preparatory act which introduces and assures the dominance of
the pleasure principle'" Thus the turn to religion in this story illustrates
the Freudian paradox of the simultaneous abandonment and fulfillment
of desire.20 One could plausibly argue that tale nos. 64 and 24 represent
a less complete binding of the instinctual impulses, with the neurosis occasioned by repressed sexuality not working itself out to its possible
limit. Pleasure, approached by a long and indirect road, is not reached in
these last two stories, even though the characters may long for it.
The presence of these intriguing parallels between Marguerite and
Freud attests to the acuteness of Marguerite's understanding of human
nature. As Rene Girard has pointed out, a creative writer may make ex17Robert D. Cottrell, in The Grammar of Silence: A Reading of Marguerite de Navarre's
Poetry (Washington, D.C., The Catholic University of America Press, 1986), has commented extensively on the use of erotic vocabulary in Marguerite's religious poetry. He
points out that the metaphor of the soul being united in marriage with Christ as bridegroom was common in the poetry of the mystics (p. 39). He indicates the major influence
of Briqonnet here, the bishop of Meaux with whom Marguerite corresponded between
1521 and 1524. I would simply add that one could argue that the use of erotic vocabulary in
Marguerite's religious poetry serves the same function that it does in the poetry in her
stories: it constitutes an evasion from sexual repression.
'8The lines from the poem are as follows:
Ne crains a prendre
L'habit de cendre
Fuyant ce monde ennemy.
Car, d'amitye vive et forte,
De sa cendre fault que sorte
Le phoenix qui durera (p. 148).
19"Pleasure Principle," S. E. 18: 62.
20Paul Ricoeur has a useful discussion of this paradox in De l'Interpre'tation:Essai sur
Freud (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1965), 272.

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Psychology of Love

87

plicit that which is only theoretically understood by a specialist.21 Citing

Freud's claim that he (Freud) attempted to investigate systematically
that which was previously the province of the creative writer, Girard
concludes that "we cannot exclude a priori the possibility that some
writers at least did as well or even better than Freud" (p. 307). These
tales demonstrate that Marguerite's intuitive grasp of human psychology enabled her to do as well.
Finally, if one is concerned with identifying a coherent philosophy
in the Heptameron,one cannot help but be troubled by the lack of agreement among the devisants in most of the discussions following the tales.
The discussions following tale nos. 64, 24, and 19 are no exception. But if
one views Marguerite de Navarre as primarily an astute psychologist,
the lack of consensus is far less unsettling. In a penetrating essay,22 W. H.
Auden has written that
The task of psychology, or art for that matter, is not to tell people how to behave, but by drawing their attention to what the impersonal unconscious is trying to tell them, and by increasing their
knowledge of good and evil, to render them better able to choose,
to become increasingly morally responsible for their destiny.
For this reason psychology is opposed to all generalizations.
. . .You cannot tell people what to do, you can only tell them
parables; and that is what art really is, particular stories of particular people and experiences, from which each according to his
immediate and peculiar needs may draw his own conclusions (pp.
340-41).
The Heptame'ronclearly fulfills the task of psychology as Auden has
articulated it. A major task for the critic of this subtle work should be
that of drawing the reader's attention to the complex psychic mechanisms of the characters in the stories, an understanding of which mechanisms renders devisant and reader alike better able to draw their own
conclusions.

21Rene Girard, "Narcissism: The Freudian Myth Demythified by Proust," in Psychoanalysis, Creativity, and Literature:A French-AmericanInquiry, ed. Alan Roland (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1978), 293-311.
22W. H. Auden, "Psychology and Art To-day," in The English Auden: Poems, Essays and
Dramatic Writings 1927-1932, ed. Edward Mendelson, (London: Faber and Faber, 1977),
332-42.

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