Hi, I'm Peter Adamson and you're listening to the History of Philosophy podcast brought to you with the support of the Philosophy Department at Kings College London and the LMU in Munich, online at historyofphilosophy.net.

Today's episode, seriously funny, Javier.

I may have mentioned at some point that I am an admirer of the silent films of Buster Keaton.

One reason they're so entertaining is Keaton's famous stone-faced demeanor, which he learned as a child on the vaudeville stage,

in a time when people would pay good money to laugh at Keaton's father, apparently beating him in public.

Buster learned that the laughs would be louder if he simply didn't react, maintaining a sober facial expression rather than crying and howling.

As the saying goes, treat light things seriously and serious things lightly.

In 16th century France, the greatest exponent of this technique was François Vablé, author of a tale, spread over four parts, plus a probably mostly inauthentic fifth additional part.

Following the adventures of two giants named Panticle and Gargantua.

Vablé is himself a giant of literature in the French language, who has been called the most difficult classical author of world religion,

by one of his most famous 20th century interpreters, the Russian scholar Mikhail Bartin.

The difficulties are many.

Vablé used stunningly varied and creative language, with different registers of speech, slang and technical vocabulary,

made up words and puns that presuppose a readership at home in both Latin and the French vernacular of the time.

When the third major character, Panouche, makes his appearance, he introduces himself in a whole series of languages,

or rather parodic versions of languages, including Greek and English, before revealing that he's actually a native French speaker.

The books are also full of pointed topical references and jokes about contemporary events,

which will pass you by if you don't follow along using a learned commentary.

Vablé's sense of humor also presents some obstacles to the modern reader.

We can appreciate the irony of treating war and tyranny as a joke, or staging an apparently serious disposition

about the best way to wipe one's bottom, but it might not actually make us laugh.

Speaking of which, there's also the regular, extensive, extravagant vulgarity.

...