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This dissertation examines how the chaotic social space of post-civil war England inspired new ideas of the ideal social structure and its ability to create social and political stability. Focusing on three non-fiction prose tracts, Margaret Cavendish’s Worlds Olio (1655), Thomas Traherne’s Christian Ethicks (1675), and Gerrard Winstanley’s Law of Freedom (1652), I use the concept of “space-making,” or “how texts aided readers in producing the space in which they understood humanity to be living” (Sauter 47), to engage three distinct perspectives on social cohesion. I situate my study within the larger context of the scientific revolution, and what Michael Sauter calls the “spatial reformation,” whereby humanist thinkers embraced Euclidean geometry to “make” space in a manner akin to God. I argue that, through their writing, Cavendish, Traherne, and Winstanley structure theoretical space to control, guide, or influence how social beings relate to one another and to the state. In doing so they make social space heterogeneous. The authors create theoretical spaces in which alternatives to England’s social structure are outlined. These alternatives reflect the subjectivity and interests of the space-maker, and while each author wishes to establish social cohesion in post-civil war England, the spaces they create reveal unique perspectives on social responsibility, free will, and self-preservation, leading readers to question the benefits and drawbacks of social cohesion. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This dissertation examines three works of non-fiction prose by Margaret Cavendish, Thomas Traherne, and Gerrard Winstanley, all of whom were seventeenth-century writers. I examine the ways that social structure in post-civil war England in fact rejects the geometric premise popular among canonical natural philosophers that all space (including the spaces we inhabit as human beings) was homogeneous. Instead, I argue that homogeneous space is oppressive in a social context, while also acknowledging that heterogeneous social spaces (spaces that are divided and have distinct "parts") also tended to limit the free will of social actors, particularly those in the lower classes. I examine themes related to free will, self-interest, and subjectivity, specifically with respect to how these themes can both create or detract from social cohesion.

The question of decline in the historiography of seventeenth-century Spain originally included socio-economic analyses that determined the decline of Spain was an economic recession. Eventually, the historiographical debate shifted to include cultural elements of seventeenth-century Spanish society. Gender within the context of decline provides further insight into how the deterioration of the Spanish economy and the deterioration of Spanish political power in Europe affected Spanish self-perception. The prolific Spanish women writers, in addition, featured their points of view on manhood in their works and created a model of masculinity known as virtuous masculinity. They expected Spanish men to perform their masculine duties as protectors and providers both in public and in private. Seventeenth-century decline influenced how women viewed masculinity. Their new model of masculinity was based on ideas that male authors had developed, but went further by emphasizing men treating their wives well.

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Cette thèse de doctorat a pour objet l’édition critique, la traduction et l’analyse de l’oeuvre théâtrale complète de François de Cortète (1585-1667). Ce seigneur agenais a évolué dans l’entourage d’Adrien de Monluc, mécène et protecteur de nombreux auteurs de langue française et de langue occitane. Le théâtre de Cortète, partiellement édité après sa mort par ses fils, présente deux pastorales qui se distinguent par un certain « souci de réalité » dans la représentation des bergers mis en scène sur les terres dont il est le seigneur. La Miramondo explore les règles d’unités ; dans son Ramonnet Cortète reprend l’éthnotype comique du matamore gascon dont il inverse le sens du ridicule en dessinant un des premiers portraits de francimand de la littérature en langue occitane ; Sancho al palays del Duc est une comédie, qui sur le modèle de Guérin de Bouscal, adapte à la scène une dizaine de chapitres du second livre du Quichotte. A l’instar du poète toulousain Pierre Godolin en poésie, Cortète exploite et illustre les ressources de la langue d’oc en produisant une oeuvre théâtrale sur le modèle des créations contemporaines des élites européennes. Ses trois pièces reflètent la richesse et ladiversité de la production théâtrale en France entre les années 1630 et 1650 ainsi que les bouleversements qui la traversent. Cette édition, réalisée à partir des manuscrits autographes, se veut aussi fidèle que possible au texte tout en veillant à préserver sa lisibilité. Elle constitue aussi la première traduction française du théâtre de Cortète de Prades. Aucune indication de datation n’ayant été donnée par l’auteur sur la chronologie de la composition de ses pièces et la bibliographie critique étant extrêmement réduite, l’analyse donnée en introduction aborde les trois pièces de manièretransversale et tente de répondre à cette problématique chronologique tout en précisant et en explorant les principales questions qui définissent la singularité de cette oeuvre. / This doctoral thesis comprises the critical edition, translation and analysis of the entire dramatic oeuvre of François de Cortète (1585-1667). This Agenais lord moved in the circles of Adrien de Monluc, patron and protector of numerous French and Occitan-language writers. Cortète’s plays, in part published posthumously by his sons, include two pastorals distinguished by a certain « concern for reality » in their representation of shepherds living on his seigneurial lands. LaMiramondo explores the three classical unities; in Ramonnet Cortète treats the comic ethnotype of the Gascon braggart (matamore), inverting its ridiculous characteristics by drawing one of the first portraits in Occitan literature of the francimand. A third play, Sancho al palays del Duc, a comedy in the style of Guérin de Bouscal, adapts for the stage a dozen chapters of the second book of Don Quixote. Following the example of the Toulouse poet Pierre Godolin, Cortète exploits the possibilities of the langue d’oc to produce dramatic works in the style of those of Europe’s elite contemporary playwrights. His three plays reflect the richness and diversity of the Theatre in France between 1630 and 1650, as well as the upheavals it lived through. This edition of the texts, based on the original manuscripts, tries to be as faithful as possible to them while preserving their readability. It also constitutes the first French translation of Cortète de Prades’ dramatic oeuvre. In the light of there being no indication of dating by the author of the chronology of composition of his plays and, moreover, thecritical bibliography being extremely small, the analysis undertaken in the introduction approaches the plays transversely and attempts to answer this chronological problem by specifying and exploring the major issues that define the uniqueness of this body of work.

Les romans édifiants des XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles – des fictions narratives en prose qui affichent clairement leur volonté de transmettre des valeurs chrétiennes et d’influencer le comportement de leurs lecteurs dans le sens de ces valeurs – développent une poétique spécifique, basée sur la recherche et le dévoilement de la vérité chrétienne à travers la fiction mondaine. Ils posent ainsi de front une question qui a hanté les écrivains et les théoriciens de l’Âge classique, à savoir la conciliation du plaisir romanesque et de la moralité. La topique du roman édifiant (personnages, lieux et temps), sa matérialité (titres, divisions internes, ensembles d’œuvres) et sa voix (narrative et rhétorique) concourent à l’élaboration d’effets de sens qui servent la visée persuasive et religieuse des ouvrages tout en créant des récits et des imaginaires propres à satisfaire le goût du lectorat pour le roman. Cette étude vise à réintégrer dans l’histoire du roman un corpus d’œuvres négligées par la critique en faisant apparaître leur contribution à l’élaboration du roman : du roman d’Ancien Régime d’abord, mais aussi du roman à thèse moderne et, par extension, de toute la fiction idéologique. / Edifying novels of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries - narrative prose fictions that clearly put forth their will to convey Christian values and influence the behavior of their readers in the sense of these values - develop a specific poetics, based on the research and the unveiling of Christian truth through mundane fiction. They therefore emphasize a problem that has haunted writers and theorists of the Classical Age, namely the reconciliation of novelistic pleasure and morality. The narrative topics of the edifying novel (characters, places and times), its materiality (titles, internal divisions, groups of works) and voice (narrative and rhetorical) contribute to the development of significations that serve the persuasive and religious aim of the works while creating stories and imaginary worlds capable of satisfying the taste of the audience for the novel. This study aims to reintegrate in the history of the novel a body of works neglected by literary critics by showing their contribution to the development of the novel: the novel of the Old Regime, but also the modern novel of thesis and by extension, the entire ideological fiction. / Réalisé en cotutelle avec l'université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle-Paris 3

This thesis considers the burlesque literary forms in the work of the seventeenth-century writer, Cyrano de Bergerac. It challenges current scholarship by looking beyond libertinism to consider the importance of Cyrano's comic writing practices. While it does not deny the philosophical and scientific focus of Cyrano's oeuvre, it suggests that the burlesque is a defining characteristic. By taking into account the literary context in which Cyrano was writing – notably the querelle des Lettres and the rise of the histoire comique – as well as looking at other comic writers that could have influenced Cyrano, and through close textual readings, this thesis reveals that burlesque forms are often used in excess in Cyrano's work – forms compete against forms – producing destructive effects; burlesque forms can, in effect, be self-defeating. This project then asks whether it is possible to consider Cyrano a comic writer at all. It does demonstrate, however, that, in ridiculing everyone and everything, Cyrano too makes a mockery of the very idea of a dissimulative text. In questioning the literary gesture that Cyrano makes through his battling burlesque forms, this thesis suggests that libertinism can appear to be one of many playful masks the author assumes in his work. Is Cyrano a burlesque libertine? If so, this thesis raises the wider question of whether there are other imposters within the ranks.