Phillip John Usher is Associate Professor of French at NYU. His research brings together the fields of Renaissance Studies and classical reception with certain theorists, thinkers, and practices of geography, ecology, and visual studies. His current ongoing project is titled "The Humanist Anthropocene." Address: French Department, NYU
19 University Place, Room 604
New York NY 10003
A collection of articled, edited by Patrick Bray and Phillip John Usher, which study the complica... more A collection of articled, edited by Patrick Bray and Phillip John Usher, which study the complicated ways in which the Louvre has functioned, since the Middle Ages until today, as a site at once esthetic and political, as debated and articulated in French literature and film.
Collection of articles, edited by Bernd Renner and Phillip John Usher, by top specialists in the ... more Collection of articles, edited by Bernd Renner and Phillip John Usher, by top specialists in the field including François Rigolot, Frank Lestringant, David Laguardia, Elisabeth Hodges, Daniel Ménager, Jean Céard, and many others. Book realized in honor of the amazing work and dedication of the wonderful Tom Conley.
Epic Arts in Renaissance France studies the relationship between epic literature and other art fo... more Epic Arts in Renaissance France studies the relationship between epic literature and other art forms such as painting, sculpture, and architecture. Why, the book asks, the epic heroes and themes so ubiquitous in French Renaissance art are widely celebrated whereas the same period's literary epics, frequently maligned, now go unread? To explore this paradox, the book investigates a number of epic building sites, i.e. specific situations in which literary epics either become the basis for realisations in other art forms or somehow contest or compete with them. Beginning with a detour about the appearance of epic heroes (Odysseus and Aeneas) on marriage chests in fifteenth-century Florence, the study traces how French communities of readers, writers, translators, and artists reinvent epic forms in their own—or their patron's—image. Following extended discussion of three galleries in different regions of France, which all depicted key scenes from the classical epics of Homer, Virgil, and Lucan, the book turns to epics written in the period. Chapters of Epic Arts focus on Etienne Dolet's Fata, which praise the victories (but also failures) of François Ier in ways that make it both a continuum of Fontainebleau and a response to the celebration of French defeat in foreign paintings; on Ronsard's Franciade, whose muse was depicted on the façade of the Louvre and whose story was eventually taken up in a long series of paintings by Toussaint Dubreuil; and on Agrippa d'Aubigné's Protestant Tragiques, which allude to, and frequently function as graffiti over, Catholic works of art in Paris and Rome. Situated at the frontier of literary criticism and art history, Epic Arts in Renaissance France is a compelling call for a revaluation of French epic literature and indeed of how we read.
Cet essai prend pour objet une époque où les frontières nationales et continentales, dans les car... more Cet essai prend pour objet une époque où les frontières nationales et continentales, dans les cartes comme dans les esprits, sont loin d’être définies avec exactitude. Il offre moins une histoire abrégée de la littérature géographique de la Renaissance qu’une tentative d’analyser la manière dont les mots articulent les relations entre différents espaces, en privilégiant deux axes : l’Europe et Jérusalem, l’Europe et le Nouveau Monde. Si les rapports entre ces espaces sont souvent ponctuels, ils participent pourtant pleinement à l’élaboration d’un savoir sur le globe terraqué. Les parcours et les récits individuels deviennent dès lors les éléments, jamais totalisables, d’une idée commune de l’espace habitable.
Ayesha Ramachandran calls this an "insightful and probing book," of which the "key interest [is] the subtle analyses of the texts it examines [..] By investigating how individual travelers' reports affect conceptualizations of entire spaces, Usher reflects on the key philosophical question of the period: the relation between self and other, part and whole, the particular and the universal [...] Usher's emphasis on movement, border crossings, and the contingency of spatial identities participates in a wider scholarly reimagining of the early modern world in terms of shifting networks of exchange and invention rather than rigidly established structures of knowledge. This book will be of interest to literary scholars as well as others engaged in questions of early modern spatiality and geography; it offers a model for nuanced interdisciplinary analysis that cuts beyond theoretical jargon and reaches into the heart of a text." (From review by Ayesha Ramachandran, in Sixteenth Century Journal, XLIII/3, 2012, p. 800-02.)
--"...l’ouvrage est extrêmement stimulant..."; "...Les analyses s’appuient toujours précisément sur les textes convoqués..."; "...la lecture d’Errance et cohérence suscite l’envie de découvrir ou de re-découvrir ces textes parfois méconnus de la littérature du XVIe siècle." (Extracts from book review by Adeline Desbois (ENS), publ. in Fabula)
First published in 1572 and never before translated into English, the first four books of Ronsard... more First published in 1572 and never before translated into English, the first four books of Ronsard’s Franciad are the closest the French Renaissance came to having an epic comparable to Camões’s Lusiads or Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso. The Franciad O tells the story of Francus, the son of Hector and survivor of the Trojan War, to whom Jupiter gives the mission of founding France.
"[Usher] brings this work to the English-speaking audience for the first time"
--Reference and Research Book News (April 2011)
"Phillip John Usher’s vibrant and highly readable translation, along with its wide-ranging notes and introduction, make the case that the poem as it stands merits a wider audience. […] It is a considerable achievement that Usher manages both to make the poem accessible to readers […] while nonetheless endowing it with a vigorous rhythm that lends itself to reading aloud. […] Usher handles Ronsard’s diction with a deft touch. […] A work of scholarship and a labor of love, this volume will deepen the appreciation of new and old readers alike.”
--Kathleen Wine (Dartmouth College). Extracts of review published in Renaissance Quarterly 64:3, Fall 2011, p. 943-45.
"A handsome volume...." "...a bold undertaking..." "...a lively, perceptive work [that] will introduce many more readers to a major work by Ronsard".
--Jean Braybrook (Birbeck, University of London), Modern Language Review, vol. 107, part 3, July 2012, p. 935-36.
Virgil's works, principally the Bucolics, the Georgics, and above all the Aeneid, were frequently... more Virgil's works, principally the Bucolics, the Georgics, and above all the Aeneid, were frequently read, translated and rewritten by authors of the French Renaissance. The contributors to this volume show how readers and writers entered into a dialogue with the texts, using them to grapple with such difficult questions as authorial, political and communitarian identities. Rather than simply imitating them, the writers are shown as vibrantly engaging with them, in a "conversation" central to the definition of literature at the time.
In addition to discussing how Virgil influenced questions of identity for such authors as Jean Lemaire de Belges, Joachim du Bellay, Clément Marot, Pierre de Ronsard and Jacques Yver, the volume also offers perspectives on Virgil's French translators, on how French writers made quite different appropriations of Homer and Virgil, and on Virgil's reception in the arts. It provides a fresh understanding and assessment of how, in sixteenth-century France, Virgil and his texts moved beyond earlier allegorical interpretations to enter into the ideas espoused by a new and national literature.
A short afterword to conclude a special issue, edited by Sara Miglietti, of the French Issue of M... more A short afterword to conclude a special issue, edited by Sara Miglietti, of the French Issue of MLN, on "Climates Past and Present: Perspectives from Early Modern France."
This article studies the presence of the island of Crete in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade (1572). ... more This article studies the presence of the island of Crete in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade (1572). After exploring the ways in which Ronsard does (not) rely on the epics of antiquity, I turn to the epic's connections to early modern "island books" or isolarii, in order to reflect on how Crete becomes not only a space for heroic action, but also for early modern politics. (Published in the Cahiers Saulnier, 2017)
Article about the giant Phovère in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade, published in the special 30th-an... more Article about the giant Phovère in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade, published in the special 30th-anniversary issue of the Revue des Amis de Ronsard.
A short preface to Michel Beaujour's posthumously published "De la poétologie comparative," which... more A short preface to Michel Beaujour's posthumously published "De la poétologie comparative," which Beaujour himself called his "Leiris fantôme." This is thus one seizièmiste's attempt to grapple with another seizièmiste's study of comparative poetics and of what turns "verbal creation" into "literary art," hence a turn to Montaigne. Also an hommage of sorts--Beaujour's "Miroirs d'encre" was the first book I read in college, way back when, and he was also my predecessor at NYU.
As part of an issue of Diacritics on "Untimely Actualities," this article takes its impetus from ... more As part of an issue of Diacritics on "Untimely Actualities," this article takes its impetus from Barbara Cassin's "Dictionary of Unstranslatables" (ed. in English by Emily Apter, Jacques Lezra, and Michael Wood, in order to ask: what do we say when we say "Anthropocene"? The point is not to offer yet another definition of, or counter-term for, the Anthropocene, but to unpack the "anthropos" within the cross-linguistic histories of which it is part (homo, humanism, posthumanism, anthropos, anthropology, etc.). What results is a clearer view of why the term, in and of itself, as it gathers meaning from other terms in the shared academic lexicon, calls for a response from the humanities.
**Pllease download this piece directly from Project Muse here (https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/36736) -it's vital to the journal's survival; I post this PDF here for those who do not have university affiliations).
Reading of accounts of Jerusalem in 16th century pilgrim narratives in the light of Foucault's no... more Reading of accounts of Jerusalem in 16th century pilgrim narratives in the light of Foucault's notion of heterotopia.
A collection of articled, edited by Patrick Bray and Phillip John Usher, which study the complica... more A collection of articled, edited by Patrick Bray and Phillip John Usher, which study the complicated ways in which the Louvre has functioned, since the Middle Ages until today, as a site at once esthetic and political, as debated and articulated in French literature and film.
Collection of articles, edited by Bernd Renner and Phillip John Usher, by top specialists in the ... more Collection of articles, edited by Bernd Renner and Phillip John Usher, by top specialists in the field including François Rigolot, Frank Lestringant, David Laguardia, Elisabeth Hodges, Daniel Ménager, Jean Céard, and many others. Book realized in honor of the amazing work and dedication of the wonderful Tom Conley.
Epic Arts in Renaissance France studies the relationship between epic literature and other art fo... more Epic Arts in Renaissance France studies the relationship between epic literature and other art forms such as painting, sculpture, and architecture. Why, the book asks, the epic heroes and themes so ubiquitous in French Renaissance art are widely celebrated whereas the same period's literary epics, frequently maligned, now go unread? To explore this paradox, the book investigates a number of epic building sites, i.e. specific situations in which literary epics either become the basis for realisations in other art forms or somehow contest or compete with them. Beginning with a detour about the appearance of epic heroes (Odysseus and Aeneas) on marriage chests in fifteenth-century Florence, the study traces how French communities of readers, writers, translators, and artists reinvent epic forms in their own—or their patron's—image. Following extended discussion of three galleries in different regions of France, which all depicted key scenes from the classical epics of Homer, Virgil, and Lucan, the book turns to epics written in the period. Chapters of Epic Arts focus on Etienne Dolet's Fata, which praise the victories (but also failures) of François Ier in ways that make it both a continuum of Fontainebleau and a response to the celebration of French defeat in foreign paintings; on Ronsard's Franciade, whose muse was depicted on the façade of the Louvre and whose story was eventually taken up in a long series of paintings by Toussaint Dubreuil; and on Agrippa d'Aubigné's Protestant Tragiques, which allude to, and frequently function as graffiti over, Catholic works of art in Paris and Rome. Situated at the frontier of literary criticism and art history, Epic Arts in Renaissance France is a compelling call for a revaluation of French epic literature and indeed of how we read.
Cet essai prend pour objet une époque où les frontières nationales et continentales, dans les car... more Cet essai prend pour objet une époque où les frontières nationales et continentales, dans les cartes comme dans les esprits, sont loin d’être définies avec exactitude. Il offre moins une histoire abrégée de la littérature géographique de la Renaissance qu’une tentative d’analyser la manière dont les mots articulent les relations entre différents espaces, en privilégiant deux axes : l’Europe et Jérusalem, l’Europe et le Nouveau Monde. Si les rapports entre ces espaces sont souvent ponctuels, ils participent pourtant pleinement à l’élaboration d’un savoir sur le globe terraqué. Les parcours et les récits individuels deviennent dès lors les éléments, jamais totalisables, d’une idée commune de l’espace habitable.
Ayesha Ramachandran calls this an "insightful and probing book," of which the "key interest [is] the subtle analyses of the texts it examines [..] By investigating how individual travelers' reports affect conceptualizations of entire spaces, Usher reflects on the key philosophical question of the period: the relation between self and other, part and whole, the particular and the universal [...] Usher's emphasis on movement, border crossings, and the contingency of spatial identities participates in a wider scholarly reimagining of the early modern world in terms of shifting networks of exchange and invention rather than rigidly established structures of knowledge. This book will be of interest to literary scholars as well as others engaged in questions of early modern spatiality and geography; it offers a model for nuanced interdisciplinary analysis that cuts beyond theoretical jargon and reaches into the heart of a text." (From review by Ayesha Ramachandran, in Sixteenth Century Journal, XLIII/3, 2012, p. 800-02.)
--"...l’ouvrage est extrêmement stimulant..."; "...Les analyses s’appuient toujours précisément sur les textes convoqués..."; "...la lecture d’Errance et cohérence suscite l’envie de découvrir ou de re-découvrir ces textes parfois méconnus de la littérature du XVIe siècle." (Extracts from book review by Adeline Desbois (ENS), publ. in Fabula)
First published in 1572 and never before translated into English, the first four books of Ronsard... more First published in 1572 and never before translated into English, the first four books of Ronsard’s Franciad are the closest the French Renaissance came to having an epic comparable to Camões’s Lusiads or Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso. The Franciad O tells the story of Francus, the son of Hector and survivor of the Trojan War, to whom Jupiter gives the mission of founding France.
"[Usher] brings this work to the English-speaking audience for the first time"
--Reference and Research Book News (April 2011)
"Phillip John Usher’s vibrant and highly readable translation, along with its wide-ranging notes and introduction, make the case that the poem as it stands merits a wider audience. […] It is a considerable achievement that Usher manages both to make the poem accessible to readers […] while nonetheless endowing it with a vigorous rhythm that lends itself to reading aloud. […] Usher handles Ronsard’s diction with a deft touch. […] A work of scholarship and a labor of love, this volume will deepen the appreciation of new and old readers alike.”
--Kathleen Wine (Dartmouth College). Extracts of review published in Renaissance Quarterly 64:3, Fall 2011, p. 943-45.
"A handsome volume...." "...a bold undertaking..." "...a lively, perceptive work [that] will introduce many more readers to a major work by Ronsard".
--Jean Braybrook (Birbeck, University of London), Modern Language Review, vol. 107, part 3, July 2012, p. 935-36.
Virgil's works, principally the Bucolics, the Georgics, and above all the Aeneid, were frequently... more Virgil's works, principally the Bucolics, the Georgics, and above all the Aeneid, were frequently read, translated and rewritten by authors of the French Renaissance. The contributors to this volume show how readers and writers entered into a dialogue with the texts, using them to grapple with such difficult questions as authorial, political and communitarian identities. Rather than simply imitating them, the writers are shown as vibrantly engaging with them, in a "conversation" central to the definition of literature at the time.
In addition to discussing how Virgil influenced questions of identity for such authors as Jean Lemaire de Belges, Joachim du Bellay, Clément Marot, Pierre de Ronsard and Jacques Yver, the volume also offers perspectives on Virgil's French translators, on how French writers made quite different appropriations of Homer and Virgil, and on Virgil's reception in the arts. It provides a fresh understanding and assessment of how, in sixteenth-century France, Virgil and his texts moved beyond earlier allegorical interpretations to enter into the ideas espoused by a new and national literature.
A short afterword to conclude a special issue, edited by Sara Miglietti, of the French Issue of M... more A short afterword to conclude a special issue, edited by Sara Miglietti, of the French Issue of MLN, on "Climates Past and Present: Perspectives from Early Modern France."
This article studies the presence of the island of Crete in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade (1572). ... more This article studies the presence of the island of Crete in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade (1572). After exploring the ways in which Ronsard does (not) rely on the epics of antiquity, I turn to the epic's connections to early modern "island books" or isolarii, in order to reflect on how Crete becomes not only a space for heroic action, but also for early modern politics. (Published in the Cahiers Saulnier, 2017)
Article about the giant Phovère in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade, published in the special 30th-an... more Article about the giant Phovère in Ronsard's epic, La Franciade, published in the special 30th-anniversary issue of the Revue des Amis de Ronsard.
A short preface to Michel Beaujour's posthumously published "De la poétologie comparative," which... more A short preface to Michel Beaujour's posthumously published "De la poétologie comparative," which Beaujour himself called his "Leiris fantôme." This is thus one seizièmiste's attempt to grapple with another seizièmiste's study of comparative poetics and of what turns "verbal creation" into "literary art," hence a turn to Montaigne. Also an hommage of sorts--Beaujour's "Miroirs d'encre" was the first book I read in college, way back when, and he was also my predecessor at NYU.
As part of an issue of Diacritics on "Untimely Actualities," this article takes its impetus from ... more As part of an issue of Diacritics on "Untimely Actualities," this article takes its impetus from Barbara Cassin's "Dictionary of Unstranslatables" (ed. in English by Emily Apter, Jacques Lezra, and Michael Wood, in order to ask: what do we say when we say "Anthropocene"? The point is not to offer yet another definition of, or counter-term for, the Anthropocene, but to unpack the "anthropos" within the cross-linguistic histories of which it is part (homo, humanism, posthumanism, anthropos, anthropology, etc.). What results is a clearer view of why the term, in and of itself, as it gathers meaning from other terms in the shared academic lexicon, calls for a response from the humanities.
**Pllease download this piece directly from Project Muse here (https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/36736) -it's vital to the journal's survival; I post this PDF here for those who do not have university affiliations).
Reading of accounts of Jerusalem in 16th century pilgrim narratives in the light of Foucault's no... more Reading of accounts of Jerusalem in 16th century pilgrim narratives in the light of Foucault's notion of heterotopia.
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Ayesha Ramachandran calls this an "insightful and probing book," of which the "key interest [is] the subtle analyses of the texts it examines [..] By investigating how individual travelers' reports affect conceptualizations of entire spaces, Usher reflects on the key philosophical question of the period: the relation between self and other, part and whole, the particular and the universal [...] Usher's emphasis on movement, border crossings, and the contingency of spatial identities participates in a wider scholarly reimagining of the early modern world in terms of shifting networks of exchange and invention rather than rigidly established structures of knowledge. This book will be of interest to literary scholars as well as others engaged in questions of early modern spatiality and geography; it offers a model for nuanced interdisciplinary analysis that cuts beyond theoretical jargon and reaches into the heart of a text." (From review by Ayesha Ramachandran, in Sixteenth Century Journal, XLIII/3, 2012, p. 800-02.)
--"...l’ouvrage est extrêmement stimulant..."; "...Les analyses s’appuient toujours précisément sur les textes convoqués..."; "...la lecture d’Errance et cohérence suscite l’envie de découvrir ou de re-découvrir ces textes parfois méconnus de la littérature du XVIe siècle." (Extracts from book review by Adeline Desbois (ENS), publ. in Fabula)
"[Usher] brings this work to the English-speaking audience for the first time"
--Reference and Research Book News (April 2011)
"Phillip John Usher’s vibrant and highly readable translation, along with its wide-ranging notes and introduction, make the case that the poem as it stands merits a wider audience. […] It is a considerable achievement that Usher manages both to make the poem accessible to readers […] while nonetheless endowing it with a vigorous rhythm that lends itself to reading aloud. […] Usher handles Ronsard’s diction with a deft touch. […] A work of scholarship and a labor of love, this volume will deepen the appreciation of new and old readers alike.”
--Kathleen Wine (Dartmouth College). Extracts of review published in Renaissance Quarterly 64:3, Fall 2011, p. 943-45.
"A handsome volume...." "...a bold undertaking..." "...a lively, perceptive work [that] will introduce many more readers to a major work by Ronsard".
--Jean Braybrook (Birbeck, University of London), Modern Language Review, vol. 107, part 3, July 2012, p. 935-36.
In addition to discussing how Virgil influenced questions of identity for such authors as Jean Lemaire de Belges, Joachim du Bellay, Clément Marot, Pierre de Ronsard and Jacques Yver, the volume also offers perspectives on Virgil's French translators, on how French writers made quite different appropriations of Homer and Virgil, and on Virgil's reception in the arts. It provides a fresh understanding and assessment of how, in sixteenth-century France, Virgil and his texts moved beyond earlier allegorical interpretations to enter into the ideas espoused by a new and national literature.
**Pllease download this piece directly from Project Muse here (https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/36736) -it's vital to the journal's survival; I post this PDF here for those who do not have university affiliations).
Ayesha Ramachandran calls this an "insightful and probing book," of which the "key interest [is] the subtle analyses of the texts it examines [..] By investigating how individual travelers' reports affect conceptualizations of entire spaces, Usher reflects on the key philosophical question of the period: the relation between self and other, part and whole, the particular and the universal [...] Usher's emphasis on movement, border crossings, and the contingency of spatial identities participates in a wider scholarly reimagining of the early modern world in terms of shifting networks of exchange and invention rather than rigidly established structures of knowledge. This book will be of interest to literary scholars as well as others engaged in questions of early modern spatiality and geography; it offers a model for nuanced interdisciplinary analysis that cuts beyond theoretical jargon and reaches into the heart of a text." (From review by Ayesha Ramachandran, in Sixteenth Century Journal, XLIII/3, 2012, p. 800-02.)
--"...l’ouvrage est extrêmement stimulant..."; "...Les analyses s’appuient toujours précisément sur les textes convoqués..."; "...la lecture d’Errance et cohérence suscite l’envie de découvrir ou de re-découvrir ces textes parfois méconnus de la littérature du XVIe siècle." (Extracts from book review by Adeline Desbois (ENS), publ. in Fabula)
"[Usher] brings this work to the English-speaking audience for the first time"
--Reference and Research Book News (April 2011)
"Phillip John Usher’s vibrant and highly readable translation, along with its wide-ranging notes and introduction, make the case that the poem as it stands merits a wider audience. […] It is a considerable achievement that Usher manages both to make the poem accessible to readers […] while nonetheless endowing it with a vigorous rhythm that lends itself to reading aloud. […] Usher handles Ronsard’s diction with a deft touch. […] A work of scholarship and a labor of love, this volume will deepen the appreciation of new and old readers alike.”
--Kathleen Wine (Dartmouth College). Extracts of review published in Renaissance Quarterly 64:3, Fall 2011, p. 943-45.
"A handsome volume...." "...a bold undertaking..." "...a lively, perceptive work [that] will introduce many more readers to a major work by Ronsard".
--Jean Braybrook (Birbeck, University of London), Modern Language Review, vol. 107, part 3, July 2012, p. 935-36.
In addition to discussing how Virgil influenced questions of identity for such authors as Jean Lemaire de Belges, Joachim du Bellay, Clément Marot, Pierre de Ronsard and Jacques Yver, the volume also offers perspectives on Virgil's French translators, on how French writers made quite different appropriations of Homer and Virgil, and on Virgil's reception in the arts. It provides a fresh understanding and assessment of how, in sixteenth-century France, Virgil and his texts moved beyond earlier allegorical interpretations to enter into the ideas espoused by a new and national literature.
**Pllease download this piece directly from Project Muse here (https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/36736) -it's vital to the journal's survival; I post this PDF here for those who do not have university affiliations).