Using the Miller-Kamuf Test to Evaluate the Role of Biography in Scholarship on Eighteenth-Century Women's Writing

Abstract:This essay revisits the 1980s debate between Nancy K. Miller, who was in favor of examining an author's biography, and Peggy Kamuf, who argued against it. In 2008, Toril Moi called for renewed theoretical engagement with their positions. I propose instead that we use what I call the Miller-Kamuf Test to evaluate how much relative weight biography and textual analysis have been given in the scholarship on a particular woman author and then use our own scholarly projects to contribute toward a better balance. Because a balanced approach can help us remember the difficulties women faced in publishing and even writing in the first place, without imposing the very stereotypes on women's literature that keep it marginalized, it can combat the destructive assumption that because eighteenth-century women authors were often inadequately educated, they were capable of writing about their own experiences, but not of offering prescriptions for changing society. In this essay, I consider two case studies. Nothing is known about the life of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's correspondent, Henriette ***, and studies of her work have relied on textual analysis alone, but imagining possible biographies for the author opens up a new range of readings. On the other hand, setting aside Louise d'Épinay's biography, which has overshadowed the textual analysis of her epistolary novel, L'Histoire de Madame de Montbrillant, results in our being able to reclassify that work as first and foremost a novel of education and reveals d'Épinay's previously hidden contributions to Enlightenment thought. The two cases demonstrate the valuable new insights that can come from balancing biography and textual analysis and ultimately demonstrate the interdependence and necessity of both Miller's and Kamuf's positions.