Pub Date : 2010-12-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12857561930796
J. Prest
Abstract Although the castrato was conspicuously absent from French opera, castrati sang regularly at the Chapelle Royale throughout most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Visiting castrati also performed in France during Mazarin's attempts at importing Italian opera during the 1640s and 1650s, and when they visited the French court as part of their travels around Europe. Meanwhile, the majority of Frenchmen and women who heard castrati sing in Italy found their performances compelling. Drawing on the writings of two French authors who held contrasting views on the castrato, I focus on the question of the castrato's suitability for the role of on-stage operatic lover (praised by the Abbé Raguenet), set against the backdrop of his ability to perform sexually off stage (questioned by Charles Ancillon). Within the Italian tradition, the castrato emerges as being eminently suited to the young lover who comes of age by becoming a hero thanks to his unique combination of femininity, masculinity and youthfulness. Off stage, the castrato is revealed to have a highly complex sexual identity that calls into question received ideas about the nature of sex, its relationship to procreation, and especially to female desire.
{"title":"In Chapel, on Stage, and in the Bedroom: French Responses to the Italian Castrato","authors":"J. Prest","doi":"10.1179/026510610X12857561930796","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1179/026510610X12857561930796","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Although the castrato was conspicuously absent from French opera, castrati sang regularly at the Chapelle Royale throughout most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Visiting castrati also performed in France during Mazarin's attempts at importing Italian opera during the 1640s and 1650s, and when they visited the French court as part of their travels around Europe. Meanwhile, the majority of Frenchmen and women who heard castrati sing in Italy found their performances compelling. Drawing on the writings of two French authors who held contrasting views on the castrato, I focus on the question of the castrato's suitability for the role of on-stage operatic lover (praised by the Abbé Raguenet), set against the backdrop of his ability to perform sexually off stage (questioned by Charles Ancillon). Within the Italian tradition, the castrato emerges as being eminently suited to the young lover who comes of age by becoming a hero thanks to his unique combination of femininity, masculinity and youthfulness. Off stage, the castrato is revealed to have a highly complex sexual identity that calls into question received ideas about the nature of sex, its relationship to procreation, and especially to female desire.","PeriodicalId":88312,"journal":{"name":"Seventeenth-century French studies","volume":"32 1","pages":"152 - 164"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1179/026510610X12857561930796","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"65819063","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444639
Elizabeth A. Hubble
Abstract This article examines three scenes in Charles Sorel's 1623 L'Histoire Comique de Francion as analogues to three medieval fabliaux, 'Le Vilain de Bailleul', 'De Jouglet', and 'La Demoiselle qui ne pouvait entendre parler de foutre'. Sorel's use of the fabliaux highlights relations between husband and wife, the representation of bodily functions, and the role of sexual language in the production of meaning and desire. In his comic novel, Sorel reframes these themes within a noble discourse that seeks to limit the carnival nature of the fabliaux. His reworking of fabliaux stories provides insight into the shifting ideologies and rhetorics of the representation of gendered bodies, gendered voices, and sexuality across the pre-modern and early modern periods. Ultimately, however, Sorel gives voice to the complex posterity of folk culture at the same time as he attempts, and perhaps fails, to master these fabliaux and their messages.
{"title":"Language, Sex, and Excrement: Charles Sorel Rewrites the Fabliaux","authors":"Elizabeth A. Hubble","doi":"10.1179/026510610X12713438444639","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1179/026510610X12713438444639","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article examines three scenes in Charles Sorel's 1623 L'Histoire Comique de Francion as analogues to three medieval fabliaux, 'Le Vilain de Bailleul', 'De Jouglet', and 'La Demoiselle qui ne pouvait entendre parler de foutre'. Sorel's use of the fabliaux highlights relations between husband and wife, the representation of bodily functions, and the role of sexual language in the production of meaning and desire. In his comic novel, Sorel reframes these themes within a noble discourse that seeks to limit the carnival nature of the fabliaux. His reworking of fabliaux stories provides insight into the shifting ideologies and rhetorics of the representation of gendered bodies, gendered voices, and sexuality across the pre-modern and early modern periods. Ultimately, however, Sorel gives voice to the complex posterity of folk culture at the same time as he attempts, and perhaps fails, to master these fabliaux and their messages.","PeriodicalId":88312,"journal":{"name":"Seventeenth-century French studies","volume":"32 1","pages":"31 - 44"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1179/026510610X12713438444639","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"65818154","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444594
Anna Rosner
Abstract La Médée de Corneille foisonne d'allusions aux fluides, dont les eaux, les larmes et le sang. Axé sur le symbolisme du sang que verse Médée et du sang bouillant qu'elle incarne, ce travail étudie la matérialisation 'liquide' de la fureur d'une femme monstrueuse. Rage et sang se confondent, tourbillonnent et débordent en Médée, engendrant une sorte d'explosion somatique; le sang de Médée dépasse les frontières du corps et se libère dans les veines de ses victimes. Quelles sont donc les origines de ce corps 'fluide' et explosif? Comme nous le soutiendrons, ce topos littéraire est ancré dans les discours médical, démonologique et tératologique.
{"title":"Médée, monstruosité, maternité: symbolismes sanguins dans la Médée de Corneille","authors":"Anna Rosner","doi":"10.1179/026510610X12713438444594","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1179/026510610X12713438444594","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract La Médée de Corneille foisonne d'allusions aux fluides, dont les eaux, les larmes et le sang. Axé sur le symbolisme du sang que verse Médée et du sang bouillant qu'elle incarne, ce travail étudie la matérialisation 'liquide' de la fureur d'une femme monstrueuse. Rage et sang se confondent, tourbillonnent et débordent en Médée, engendrant une sorte d'explosion somatique; le sang de Médée dépasse les frontières du corps et se libère dans les veines de ses victimes. Quelles sont donc les origines de ce corps 'fluide' et explosif? Comme nous le soutiendrons, ce topos littéraire est ancré dans les discours médical, démonologique et tératologique.","PeriodicalId":88312,"journal":{"name":"Seventeenth-century French studies","volume":"32 1","pages":"19 - 30"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1179/026510610X12713438444594","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"65818552","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444792
D. Hodson
Abstract Despite the large number of references to diplomatic blunders by the French during Süleyman Ağa's visit to Paris in 1669 and the charade-like character of much of Louis XIV's policies towards the Ottoman Empire during the period, few scholars have seen the humour in Le Bourgeois gentilhomme as directed towards the crown and court. In this article, I argue that Molière's comedy-ballet can be read as a pointed satire of how Hugues de Lionne, the foreign minister, and the king received the Ottoman envoy in their official audiences, and of French foreign policy with the Ottoman state itself. The mummery involved in Lionne's receiving Süleyman as the 'Grand Vizier' of France, and the king's pretence in expecting to be viewed as a crusading monarch while diligently pursuing commercial relations with the Porte, provided Molière with ample material for satirical development. The oriental trappings of the work, especially of the Turkish ceremony, might thus be considered as a means to mirror and criticize French governmental policies and behaviour rather than as a proto-colonialist attempt imaginatively to represent the Ottoman Turk.
尽管有大量文献提到法国人在1669年莱曼Ağa访问巴黎期间的外交失误，以及路易十四在此期间对奥斯曼帝国的许多政策的字谜式特征，但很少有学者看到Le Bourgeois gentilhomme中的幽默是针对王室和宫廷的。在这篇文章中，我认为moli特的喜剧芭蕾可以被理解为对外交部长Hugues de Lionne和国王如何在他们的官方观众中接待奥斯曼特使以及法国对奥斯曼国家本身的外交政策的尖锐讽刺。莱昂内接受莱曼为法国“大维齐尔”所涉及的闹剧，以及国王希望被视为十字军君主的假装，同时努力寻求与波特的商业关系，为moli特提供了充足的讽刺素材。作品的东方装饰，尤其是土耳其仪式，因此可能被认为是反映和批评法国政府政策和行为的一种手段，而不是作为一种原始的殖民主义者试图富有想象力地代表奥斯曼土耳其人。
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Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444558
Ruth Whelan
Abstract The interaction between power and dissidence in representational culture is the focus of this article, which weaves together some of Pascal's reflections on power and imagination, the notion of the King's two bodies, and its representation in contemporary film, with the symbolism of the wounded body in French Protestant galley slave narratives. The galleys were a baroque theatre of power, which were intended to represent the King's glory. But Protestant galley slaves positioned themselves, by means of their narratives, as witnesses, whose wounded bodies spoke not of glory but of abuse of power, and in this way they subverted the representational function of the galleys. However, the role of the witness, which they ascribe to themselves, is problematic, because developments in the experimental sciences meant that the witness was perceived at the time as a dispassionate observer. Yet bearing witness to limit experiences requires affect. The article studies the way this problem is addressed in the interplay between the narrative construct of the first- and the second-degree witnesses in one Protestant galley slave narrative, which tells the story of Louis de Marolles. The body, whether the symbolic body of the King, the mystical body of Christ, or the wounded body of the galley slave, is a shifting sign, which gives insight into the competing political and religious discourses of the day.
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Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444837
V. Grégoire
Abstract Marie Guyart dite de l'Incarnation, une religieuse tourangelle à l'origine de la fondation du couvent des ursulines de Québec en 1639, s'oppose, peu après son arrivée, à des pères jésuites missionnaires responsables de la bonne marche du couvent. En effet, elle a appris que deux d'entre eux avaient essayé de modifier, sans consultation aucune, les règlements de l'établissement reposant sur un amalgame des statuts des deux maisons d'origine (Paris et Bordeaux). Un peu plus d'une quinzaine d'années plus tard, c'est le vicaire apostolique nouvellement nommé, Mgr de Montmorency-Laval, qui va chercher à effectuer une même modification des statuts du couvent. Nous allons, dans cette étude, analyser la difficulté pour la supérieure ursuline de s'opposer à l'autorité religieuse masculine, et le déchirement intérieur que cette opposition fait naître en elle. Ce déchirement intérieur fait cependant rapidement place, chez la religieuse, à une obligation de résister, ainsi qu'elle décrit son attitude dans sa correspondance. En quoi consiste cette obligation de résister et, une fois mise en pratique, à quels résultats va-t-elle aboutir? Cet esprit d'opposition ne trouve-t-il pas en partie son origine dans le fait que la sæur soit une ursuline, dont la vocation est de prier et aussi d'enseigner, mais encore dans le fait qu'elle ait été veuve et indépendante très jeune, et qu'elle ait assumé des responsabilités importantes dans l'entreprise de son beau-frère avant d'entrer en religion?
{"title":"Devoir d'obéissance, obligation de résistance: lorsqu'une ursuline s'oppose à l'autorité masculine au dix-septième siècle","authors":"V. Grégoire","doi":"10.1179/026510610X12713438444837","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1179/026510610X12713438444837","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Marie Guyart dite de l'Incarnation, une religieuse tourangelle à l'origine de la fondation du couvent des ursulines de Québec en 1639, s'oppose, peu après son arrivée, à des pères jésuites missionnaires responsables de la bonne marche du couvent. En effet, elle a appris que deux d'entre eux avaient essayé de modifier, sans consultation aucune, les règlements de l'établissement reposant sur un amalgame des statuts des deux maisons d'origine (Paris et Bordeaux). Un peu plus d'une quinzaine d'années plus tard, c'est le vicaire apostolique nouvellement nommé, Mgr de Montmorency-Laval, qui va chercher à effectuer une même modification des statuts du couvent. Nous allons, dans cette étude, analyser la difficulté pour la supérieure ursuline de s'opposer à l'autorité religieuse masculine, et le déchirement intérieur que cette opposition fait naître en elle. Ce déchirement intérieur fait cependant rapidement place, chez la religieuse, à une obligation de résister, ainsi qu'elle décrit son attitude dans sa correspondance. En quoi consiste cette obligation de résister et, une fois mise en pratique, à quels résultats va-t-elle aboutir? Cet esprit d'opposition ne trouve-t-il pas en partie son origine dans le fait que la sæur soit une ursuline, dont la vocation est de prier et aussi d'enseigner, mais encore dans le fait qu'elle ait été veuve et indépendante très jeune, et qu'elle ait assumé des responsabilités importantes dans l'entreprise de son beau-frère avant d'entrer en religion?","PeriodicalId":88312,"journal":{"name":"Seventeenth-century French studies","volume":"32 1","pages":"102 - 117"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1179/026510610X12713438444837","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"65818729","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444710
Gábor Gelléri
Abstract Tout au long du dix-septième siècle, la situation précaire des huguenots français les oblige à prendre position sur la question du pouvoir royal. Le contexte franco-anglais leur fournit un cadre privilégié pour s'exprimer sur ce point. Les huguenots sont d'abord horrifiés des événements de la guerre civile, et notamment de l'offense faite à Charles Ier; sous la Restauration, Sorbière, ancien huguenot et libertin érudit, voit son livre interdit pour avoir évoqué l'instabilité du régime en Angleterre. Après 1685 et 1688, l'opinion sur l'Angleterre divise la communauté huguenote: soutenir la cause anglaise revient à abandonner tout espoir de retour en France. Parce qu'ils se font l'écho des débats de leur communauté, et que les représentations du pouvoir royal qu'ils donnent sont chargées d'enjeux, les réactions des pasteurs nous intéressent particulièrement. En 1691, Jacques Abbadie estime que la souffrance subie justifie toute critique du pouvoir qui l'a infligée. Une quinzaine d'années plus tard, Jean-Armand Dubourdieu parle déjà du point de vue des huguenots qui s'établissent en Angleterre: il plaint la France, terre d'esclavage, et ne voit plus pourquoi les huguenots devraient y retourner. Son sermon sur 'le bon sujet' rappelle à ses coreligionnaires que leur souhait le plus important doit être le maintien de la monarchie protestante.
{"title":"Représentations du pouvoir royal dans le discours huguenot","authors":"Gábor Gelléri","doi":"10.1179/026510610X12713438444710","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1179/026510610X12713438444710","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Tout au long du dix-septième siècle, la situation précaire des huguenots français les oblige à prendre position sur la question du pouvoir royal. Le contexte franco-anglais leur fournit un cadre privilégié pour s'exprimer sur ce point. Les huguenots sont d'abord horrifiés des événements de la guerre civile, et notamment de l'offense faite à Charles Ier; sous la Restauration, Sorbière, ancien huguenot et libertin érudit, voit son livre interdit pour avoir évoqué l'instabilité du régime en Angleterre. Après 1685 et 1688, l'opinion sur l'Angleterre divise la communauté huguenote: soutenir la cause anglaise revient à abandonner tout espoir de retour en France. Parce qu'ils se font l'écho des débats de leur communauté, et que les représentations du pouvoir royal qu'ils donnent sont chargées d'enjeux, les réactions des pasteurs nous intéressent particulièrement. En 1691, Jacques Abbadie estime que la souffrance subie justifie toute critique du pouvoir qui l'a infligée. Une quinzaine d'années plus tard, Jean-Armand Dubourdieu parle déjà du point de vue des huguenots qui s'établissent en Angleterre: il plaint la France, terre d'esclavage, et ne voit plus pourquoi les huguenots devraient y retourner. Son sermon sur 'le bon sujet' rappelle à ses coreligionnaires que leur souhait le plus important doit être le maintien de la monarchie protestante.","PeriodicalId":88312,"journal":{"name":"Seventeenth-century French studies","volume":"32 1","pages":"61 - 73"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1179/026510610X12713438444710","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"65819013","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444756
Michael Harrigan
Abstract Seventeenth-century French descriptions of Asian peoples testify to a constant fascination with 'oriental' gender roles. The concubine enclosed in the harem of a despotic monarch, and the tragic sati, are among the most familiar figures of the women of the East. This article examines a manifestation which has received less attention: that of the female royalty about whom travellers claimed to have garnered privileged eye-witness testimony. The reports of traders, ecclesiastics, ambassadors, or mercenaries reflect the heterogeneous nature of French contacts with Asia and with different strata of diverse societies. Vivid manifestations of female royalty are depicted at various levels of power: virtuous warrior princesses from Persia, immoral Chinese queens, or the creators or supporters of factions within the intrigues attributed to eastern courts. Yet these women remain distanced, to varying extents, from the traveller. Isolated from sight, or far removed in space or in time, they are often represented in histoires or anecdotes of considerable moral or dramatic interest. In an East made recognisable through fictional strategies, they characterise the governance of Asia, while edifying or entertaining readers.
{"title":"The Question of Female Authority in Seventeenth-Century French Depictions of Eastern Monarchies","authors":"Michael Harrigan","doi":"10.1179/026510610X12713438444756","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1179/026510610X12713438444756","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Seventeenth-century French descriptions of Asian peoples testify to a constant fascination with 'oriental' gender roles. The concubine enclosed in the harem of a despotic monarch, and the tragic sati, are among the most familiar figures of the women of the East. This article examines a manifestation which has received less attention: that of the female royalty about whom travellers claimed to have garnered privileged eye-witness testimony. The reports of traders, ecclesiastics, ambassadors, or mercenaries reflect the heterogeneous nature of French contacts with Asia and with different strata of diverse societies. Vivid manifestations of female royalty are depicted at various levels of power: virtuous warrior princesses from Persia, immoral Chinese queens, or the creators or supporters of factions within the intrigues attributed to eastern courts. Yet these women remain distanced, to varying extents, from the traveller. Isolated from sight, or far removed in space or in time, they are often represented in histoires or anecdotes of considerable moral or dramatic interest. In an East made recognisable through fictional strategies, they characterise the governance of Asia, while edifying or entertaining readers.","PeriodicalId":88312,"journal":{"name":"Seventeenth-century French studies","volume":"32 1","pages":"74 - 89"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1179/026510610X12713438444756","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"65818596","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2010-07-01DOI: 10.1179/026510610X12713438444675
R. Maber
Abstract The late work of Gilles Ménage (1613–1692), Historia mulierum philosopharum (1690), is a compilation of all the information that he could gather concerning women philosophers from earliest antiquity to the fourteenth century. It made little impact when first published, but is currently the subject of renewed interest in the context of women's studies, with recent translations into English, French, Italian, and Spanish. However the work's true importance is much greater than has been realised. Ménage included it, as he had always intended, in his monumental and definitive edition of Diogenes Laertius's Lives of the Philosophers (1692), the greatest known source of information about the (male) philosophers of antiquity. Ménage's Historia thus became a supplement, and corrective, to Diogenes Laertius, and was included with subsequent editions and translations of the irreplaceable Greek text. In this way, the reality of women's capacity for the highest intellectual achievement was incontrovertibly established, and women were integrated into the mainstream of the history of philosophy. An analysis of the frontispieces to the three volumes of Chauffepié's translation of Diogenes (1758) demonstrates how, thanks explicitly to Ménage's work, the role of women was now seen as crucial to modern intellectual life.
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