Publishing Women's Life Stories in France, 1647-1720: From Voice to Print

by Goldsmith,Elizabeth C.

• ISBN13: 9780754603702
• ISBN10: 0754603709
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-05-28
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Elizabeth Goldsmith here examines how French women in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries first came to publish their private life stories; in doing so, she explores what the writers have to say about why they decide to write about themselves, what they choose to write, how they get their stories circulated and printed, and what they do to defend themselves against the threat to personal reputation and credibility that was implied by such public self-exposure.Goldsmith scrutinizes the autobiographical writing of six women, considering the different forms that the life writing of these women took: autobiographies; letter correspondences (which in four of the six cases have never before been published); trial transcripts; testimonials published as part of other authors' works; and written self-portraits that were circulated among friends.Drawing on the work of Michel de Certeau on voice and communities of readers in the 17th century, as well as the work of Roger Chartier and other historians of the book and print culture, Goldsmith retraces the complicated networks of human interaction that underlie these early autobiographies and their publication history.

Author Biography

Elizabeth C. Goldsmith is Professor of French at Boston University in the USA

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	vi
List of Figures	vii
Introduction	1	(11)
Discovering New Worlds: Marie de 1'Incarnation and the Process of Autobiography	12	(30)
Public Sanctity and Private Writing: The Autobiography of Jeanne des Anges	42	(29)
Silent Communications: The Life and Letters of Jeanne Guyon	71	(27)
Scripting Errant Lives: The Memoirs of Hortense and Marie Mancini	98	(36)
Overheard Conversations: Madame de Villedieu's Autobiographical Fictions	134	(22)
Conclusion	156	(6)
Bibliography	162	(7)
Index	169