Garros, Pey de

▪ French poet

born c. 1530, , Lectoure, near Agen, France

died 1585, Pau

      Provençal poet whose work raised the Gascon dialect to the rank of a literary language in 16th-century France.

      A Protestant, Garros studied law, theology, and Hebrew at the University of Toulouse and later became avocat-général of Pau. In the preface to his Poesias gasconas (1567; “Gascon Poetry”) he chided his fellow countrymen for preferring French to Gascon and pleaded for a restoration of the native dialect. He published a rhymed Gascon translation of the Psalms of David (1565). His Églogues go beyond the imitation of classical models, attempting to capture the true flavour of Gascon peasant life.

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