Art Institute of Chicago

The Adventure of the Chamber Pot, plate four from Scènes du Roman Comique

Jean-Baptiste Oudry

Date

n.d.

Medium

Etching on ivory laid paper

Culture

France

Department

Prints and Drawings

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

Jean-Baptiste Oudry turned his hand to comic genre in this etching, which illustrates a scene from Paul Scarron’s 1651 novel, Roman Comique . Scarron’s misanthropic and drunken character, La Rancune, accepts a merchant’s kind offer to share the inn’s last bed. Ungrateful, La Rancune repeatedly awakens his benefactor from sound sleep, demanding the chamber pot, without relieving himself. Finally, after elbowing the merchant’s stomach and nearly strangling him, he asks again, fills the chamber pot to the brim and then empties it over the merchant’s head. By this malicious ruse he secures the entire bed for himself for the rest of the night.

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