Francois Rabelais (1494? - 1553), French humorist and satirist. The word "Rabelaisian" has been applied to the type of broad and coarse humor which fills his works. His greatest work, Gargantua and Pantagruel, relates the adventures of Gargantua, a giant with a n enormous appetite and his son Pantagruel, the "king of drunkards." The book is a sort of burlesque of politics, education and the church as they existed in his time. Rabelais was in his own way a philosopher who disagreed with the hidebound customs of his day. His books expressed his ideals of free and joyous living and ridiculed the strict principles of living taught by the church. —PDC Volume 7 Approved Glossary