The Nouvelles Recreations et Joyeaux Devis of Bonaventure des Periers are here translated for the first time into modern English. The translators have been successful in retaining the vitality of this important French Renaissance satirist, turning his colloquial sixteenth-century French into equally colloquial and lively American. The translation of the 129 tales is prefaced by a biographical study of des Periers both as man and artist, and a critical bibliography is also included.

This study is based on a detailed analysis of the textual variants and revisions that reflect the poet's linear development from his poetic debut in 1922 to the present.