The Repentant Abelard

Abelard was one of the greatest thinkers of the 12th century, a man of towering brilliance and arrogance, but his poetic works written late in life for his wife Heloise and son Astrolabe reveal a different and more humble man. In the "Planctus" (six laments in the voices of Old Testament figures) and "Carmen ad Astralabium" (a poem of paternal advice) we see a man newly coming to terms with the life around him, expressing a simple but heartfelt piety, raging against social injustices and the exploitation of the poor, and re-evaluating the importance of rhetoric and education. Most significantly, we find a man struggling to comprehend, through poems written to the wife and child he abandoned, the divine mysteries of love, relationships and family.