This thesis examines the literary representations of Jeanne d’Albret (1528-1572), Queen of Navarre. While this historical figure has already known many historical studies, this work seeks to highlight her importance in French literature, as subject, patron and writer herself. Concentrating on the theme of feminine exemplarity and its rhetorical implications, this study will show the evolution and transformation of Jeanne d’Albret’s representation in the literary world, from various epidictic pieces composed for her during her childhood, to the legacy of a woman of letters, to the celebration of a strong Calvinist Queen, and eventually to the shadowing of these successes in the eighteenth-century Encyclopédie. / Graduate

It has long been recognized that Flaubert took a great deal of interest in the literature of classical antiquity. Contemporaries such as Gautier and Maupassant considered him widely-read; a significant minority of his works - La Tentation de saint Antoine, Salammbô and Hérodias- are set roughly during the classical period; and a number of critics have investigated specific aspects of his debt to antiquity. Generally critics have concentrated on Flaubert's documentary use of the literature of antiquity in the works mentioned above (this is Benedetto's and Seznec's approach) or on the incorporation of mythical imagery and symbolism into his work (this is Lowe's approach in Towards the real Flaubert). A few articles have dealt with specific classical works to which Flaubert may be indebted artistically, but there has been to my knowledge no attempt to define the overall effect upon Flaubert's work, in terms of textual influence or more broadly, of his interest in antiquity. I have attempted in this study to evaluate the impact of the literature of classical antiquity upon Flaubert's entire œuvre. I first attempt to define, mainly by reference to the Correspondance, the extent of his knowledge of classical literature. I then consider his works - juvenilia and adult material - in approximately chronological order in the light of the writers he knew and admired, with a view to suggesting ways in which classical texts may have influenced them; textual influence is investigated closely, but attention is also paid to the use of classical themes, imagery and symbolism. Works with a modern setting are considered as well as those of a more obviously classical pedigree. Having identified a range of authors as being of importance - including Homer, Virgil, Ovid and Apuleius - I conclude by considering more broadly Flaubert's position relative to that of his contemporaries and the overall implications of my findings for the understanding of his work.

The "essai crepusculaire" was one of the most popular literary genres during the 1980's and 1990's in France. Among those, the essays warning of the impending end of French literature offer a view of the world which idealises the past while condemning a shameful present in order to justify the return of lost values. / Our project consists of an analysis of the argumentative rhetoric contained in the four essays of our corpus, which together form the Discourse on the death of French literature. We studied how the authors set up an argumentative construct likely to convince the reader that French literature has fallen into decay. By analysing the rhetorical processes as well as locating the tacit discourse, we sought to single out the ideology which they promote and to make out the contours of the literary ideal which they delineate. In light of these observations, we ended with the broad outline of a typology of the genre, liable to exemplify all "essais crepusculaires".

Across continents and independently of one another, Marianne Moore (1887-1972) and Francis Ponge (1899-1988) both made names for themselves in the twentieth century as poets who gave voice to things. Their entire oeuvres are dominated by poems that attempt to reconstruct an external thing (inanimate object, plant or animal being) through language, while emphasizing the necessary distance that exists between the writing self and the written other. Furthermore, their thing poetry establishes an “essential otherness” to the subject of representation that (ideally) rejects an objectification of that subject, thereby rendering the “thing” a subject-thing with its own being-for-itself. This dissertation argues that the thing poetry of Marianne Moore and Francis Ponge successfully challenged the hierarchy between subject and object in representation by bringing the poet’s self into a dialogue with the encountered thing. The relationship between the writing self and the written other is akin to what Maurice Merleau-Ponty refers to in Le visible et l’invisible when he describes the act of perceiving what is visible as necessitating one’s own visibility to another. The other becomes a mirror of oneself and vice versa, Merleau-Ponty explains, to the extent that together they compose a single image. The type of reflection involving self and others that Moore and Ponge employ in their thing poetry invokes the characteristically modern symbol of the crystal with its kaleidoscopic reflective properties. Self and other are distinct yet indissolubly bound, and rather than a hierarchy between subject and object there are only subjects who exist for-themselves and for-each other, reflecting the kind of reciprocal Pour soi that Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology envisioned.

Across continents and independently of one another, Marianne Moore (1887-1972) and Francis Ponge (1899-1988) both made names for themselves in the twentieth century as poets who gave voice to things. Their entire oeuvres are dominated by poems that attempt to reconstruct an external thing (inanimate object, plant or animal being) through language, while emphasizing the necessary distance that exists between the writing self and the written other. Furthermore, their thing poetry establishes an “essential otherness” to the subject of representation that (ideally) rejects an objectification of that subject, thereby rendering the “thing” a subject-thing with its own being-for-itself. This dissertation argues that the thing poetry of Marianne Moore and Francis Ponge successfully challenged the hierarchy between subject and object in representation by bringing the poet’s self into a dialogue with the encountered thing. The relationship between the writing self and the written other is akin to what Maurice Merleau-Ponty refers to in Le visible et l’invisible when he describes the act of perceiving what is visible as necessitating one’s own visibility to another. The other becomes a mirror of oneself and vice versa, Merleau-Ponty explains, to the extent that together they compose a single image. The type of reflection involving self and others that Moore and Ponge employ in their thing poetry invokes the characteristically modern symbol of the crystal with its kaleidoscopic reflective properties. Self and other are distinct yet indissolubly bound, and rather than a hierarchy between subject and object there are only subjects who exist for-themselves and for-each other, reflecting the kind of reciprocal Pour soi that Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology envisioned.

No description available.

Thesis (M.A. in history)--Washington State University, May 2009. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on Apr. 2, 2009). "Department of History." Includes bibliographical references (p. 88-91).

Thesis (doctoral)--Université Paris-Nord, 1997. / At head of title: Université Paris Nord, Paris XIII. Includes bibliographical references (p. 435-459).

Originally presented as the author's Thesis (doctoral)--Johan Wolfgang von Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main, 1976. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 275-280).

Thesis--Catholic University of America. / Bibliography: p. 199-205.