SOURCE: “‘Written in the Mind with an Iron Pen’: The Failure of Misogynistic Cliché; in the Rondibilis Episode of Rabelais's Tiers Livre (31-34),” in French Studies, Vol. XLIX, No. 3, July 1995, pp. 275-82.

In the following essay, Berry considers the gender ideology behind Panurge's quest for a wife in Tiers Livre. Berry states: “Trapped between contradictory clichés about women,” Panurge is “unable to proceed with the projects of marriage and paternity he so desperately wants to undertake.”

The consultation with the physician Rondibilis in Rabelais's Tiers Livre is one of the most shockingly misogynistic episodes in all of his four books. Panurge, we remember, wants to know if he should marry or not, a question which leads him to consult with figures representative of all known forms of wisdom, human and divine. As do all of the earthly sages, Rondibilis tells him he should. If Panurge feels ‘les...