Understanding Rancé: The Spirituality of the Abbot of La Trappe in Context
By Dr. David N. Bell
Both during his lifetime and afterwards Armand Jean le Bouthiellier, the abbé de Rancé, was a controversial figure. Alive, he was extravagantly admired by many, yet had, as one recent biographer observed, "an unhappy genius for incurring hostility unnecessarily."
Dead, he continued to evoke extreme reactions he was either loved or loathed. One biographer nicknamed him "the thundering abbot;" others depicted him in hagiographical panegyrics. The present volume sets Rancé against the colourful and extravagant world of seventeenth-century France and corrects both masterly and entertaining caricatures by exploring the world which surrounded and formed this ever fascinating monk: the privileged circles of the ancient regime in which Rancé moved from his birth in 1626; and the austere monastic environment he created at la Trappe. "This is not so much a book about Rancé as around Rancé," Dr. Bell writes. "I do not expect that it will persuade people who do not like Rancé to like him; it may, however, serve to explain why he said and did what he said and did in the way that he said and did."
Dr. Bell is a University Research Professor of Religious Studies. His previous books with Cistercian Publications include translations of two works Baldwin of Forde; two hagiographic works translated from the Coptic; three volumes of medieval monastic indices; two volumes on the history of Christian doctrine; and Image and Likeness: The Augustinian Spirituality of William of Saint Thierry. Understanding Rancé is published by Cistercian Publications.
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