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"Epouser la déesse": essais sur la femme, le surnaturel et l'hyperbole
Starting with the figure of Keats' Belle Dame sans Merci, this collection of essays in an investigation into how and why women have appeared as fairies, goddesses, ghosts, works of art and, in general, immortals, in selected works of literation and cinema over the past 200 years.
The subject matter ranges from the actual supernatural – encounters between a mortan man and an immortal woman – to narratives devoid of the fantastic or supernatural in which woman characters are persistently likened to goddesses and mythological or historically prominent figures. As an offshoot, we will delve into the significance of another form of immortality through the haunted portrait, statue or work of art.
The works examined fall accordingly into two categories. Narratives that emplot an actual encounter between an mortal man and an immortal woman, often derived from the traditional tale of the Knight and the Fairy (or variations thereof) in which there is a remarkably persistent pattern that determines the character of the mortal, the appearance and behaviour of the fairy, the setting of the encounter, the means of communication between the two, and the ultimate fate of one or the other of the characters, drawn from different, conflicting or contingent planes of existence. We note a major shift that marks more recent tales of the supernatural in which association between mortal and immortal are no longer doomed to failure, as in the range of vampire-insired novels and movies, not covered by this study, reflecting the weakening of traditional Christian caveats.
In our second field of investigation, Fin de Siècle and more recent authors, who employ hyperbole to liken women to larger-than-life figures or works of art, we have downplayed the figure of the abusive Femme Fatale in favour of less radical interpretations. Our contention is that authors such as Gabriele D'Annunzio, H. Rider Haggard, E.R. Eddison and others use the mythological or historical reference or identification of their woman characters both to ward off images of ageing and decay and to tie in the imperfect and decadent present with a hallowed mythological past.
At the same time, masters of irony such as James Branch Cabell deconstruct the process whereby the male hankers after the ideal woman (represented by, or likened to, all these mythological figures) while failing to realize the intrinsic worth of women around him, ruining his life (and theirs as well) in a fruitless quest.
Throughout these essays, one of our major concerns has been to question how these stories end, from the supernatural and the fantastic to the realistic (stories set in real-life situations). Does the reliance on mythological tropes and formulas doom such love stories to failure, as posited by Denis de Rougemont in his study of the Tristan myth ? As exemplified by the often disastrous marriages of media and movie icons in the real world ? Or is it possible to ''wed the Goddess'', an ambition posited as the only honourable issue in an uxorious tradition that is to be found more often than not in America ?
Our approach is broadly comparative, embracing authors from France, Italy, the United States and India. Authors are drawn from a cross-section of genres, the decadent novel, fantasy, satire, adventure, poetry, with a foray into the Hollywood fantastic of the 1940s.
As such, the originality of this work lies in associations not usually encountered. Hence, a major part of E.R. Eddison's inspiration can be compared with that of Gabriele D'Annunzio, two authors who are not normally set side-by-side. This volume boasts of one of the only in-depth studies of James Branch Cabell, also known (alongside Eddison and Dunsany) as a founding father of Fantasy, revealing his inspirational links with authors as diverse as Sinclair Lewis. Wiliam Morris, whose influence on later writers such as J.R.R. Tolkien cannot be underestimated, has a chapter of his own, focused on his two ''Gothic'' novels and the figure of the Valkyrie. And H. Rider Haggard, who, along with Pierre Benoit on the continent, appears as the arch-celebrant of the amorous Queen-Goddess with She, is quite rightfully at the centre of two chapters, the second of which being a fundemental (and unprecedented) questioning of the fascinating evolution of ''She'' over four decades of Rider Haggard's literary career, justifying her signal position as inspiration for the Jungian Anima while her variegated and appealing personality, far from misogynist clichés, has exerted far more influence over later writers than is usually supposed.
The archetype of the Courtesan is the occasion for a comparative study of the Tawaif in late nineteenth century Urdu literature and the tragic figure of the ''Dame aux Camélias'' in France at the same time. Another chapter, devoted to the Automat, is made up of new readings of classical works such as Villiers de l'Isle-Adam's L'Eve future, along with lesser-known novels by Marc Chadourne and Lawre...
The subject matter ranges from the actual supernatural – encounters between a mortan man and an immortal woman – to narratives devoid of the fantastic or supernatural in which woman characters are persistently likened to goddesses and mythological or historically prominent figures. As an offshoot, we will delve into the significance of another form of immortality through the haunted portrait, statue or work of art.
The works examined fall accordingly into two categories. Narratives that emplot an actual encounter between an mortal man and an immortal woman, often derived from the traditional tale of the Knight and the Fairy (or variations thereof) in which there is a remarkably persistent pattern that determines the character of the mortal, the appearance and behaviour of the fairy, the setting of the encounter, the means of communication between the two, and the ultimate fate of one or the other of the characters, drawn from different, conflicting or contingent planes of existence. We note a major shift that marks more recent tales of the supernatural in which association between mortal and immortal are no longer doomed to failure, as in the range of vampire-insired novels and movies, not covered by this study, reflecting the weakening of traditional Christian caveats.
In our second field of investigation, Fin de Siècle and more recent authors, who employ hyperbole to liken women to larger-than-life figures or works of art, we have downplayed the figure of the abusive Femme Fatale in favour of less radical interpretations. Our contention is that authors such as Gabriele D'Annunzio, H. Rider Haggard, E.R. Eddison and others use the mythological or historical reference or identification of their woman characters both to ward off images of ageing and decay and to tie in the imperfect and decadent present with a hallowed mythological past.
At the same time, masters of irony such as James Branch Cabell deconstruct the process whereby the male hankers after the ideal woman (represented by, or likened to, all these mythological figures) while failing to realize the intrinsic worth of women around him, ruining his life (and theirs as well) in a fruitless quest.
Throughout these essays, one of our major concerns has been to question how these stories end, from the supernatural and the fantastic to the realistic (stories set in real-life situations). Does the reliance on mythological tropes and formulas doom such love stories to failure, as posited by Denis de Rougemont in his study of the Tristan myth ? As exemplified by the often disastrous marriages of media and movie icons in the real world ? Or is it possible to ''wed the Goddess'', an ambition posited as the only honourable issue in an uxorious tradition that is to be found more often than not in America ?
Our approach is broadly comparative, embracing authors from France, Italy, the United States and India. Authors are drawn from a cross-section of genres, the decadent novel, fantasy, satire, adventure, poetry, with a foray into the Hollywood fantastic of the 1940s.
As such, the originality of this work lies in associations not usually encountered. Hence, a major part of E.R. Eddison's inspiration can be compared with that of Gabriele D'Annunzio, two authors who are not normally set side-by-side. This volume boasts of one of the only in-depth studies of James Branch Cabell, also known (alongside Eddison and Dunsany) as a founding father of Fantasy, revealing his inspirational links with authors as diverse as Sinclair Lewis. Wiliam Morris, whose influence on later writers such as J.R.R. Tolkien cannot be underestimated, has a chapter of his own, focused on his two ''Gothic'' novels and the figure of the Valkyrie. And H. Rider Haggard, who, along with Pierre Benoit on the continent, appears as the arch-celebrant of the amorous Queen-Goddess with She, is quite rightfully at the centre of two chapters, the second of which being a fundemental (and unprecedented) questioning of the fascinating evolution of ''She'' over four decades of Rider Haggard's literary career, justifying her signal position as inspiration for the Jungian Anima while her variegated and appealing personality, far from misogynist clichés, has exerted far more influence over later writers than is usually supposed.
The archetype of the Courtesan is the occasion for a comparative study of the Tawaif in late nineteenth century Urdu literature and the tragic figure of the ''Dame aux Camélias'' in France at the same time. Another chapter, devoted to the Automat, is made up of new readings of classical works such as Villiers de l'Isle-Adam's L'Eve future, along with lesser-known novels by Marc Chadourne and Lawre...
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Published July 1, 2021
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