Blessed Motherhood, Bitter Fruit: Nelly Roussel And the Politics of Female Pain in Third Republic France

by Accampo, Elinor Ann

• ISBN13: 9780801884047
• ISBN10: 0801884047
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-08-01
• Publisher: JOHNS HOPKINS UNIV PRESS

Summary

Nelly Roussel (1878--1922) -- the first feminist spokeswoman for birth control in Europe -- challenged both the men of early twentieth-century France, who sought to preserve the status quo, and the women who aimed to change it. She delivered her messages through public lectures, journalism, and theater, dazzling audiences with her beauty, intelligence, and disarming wit. She did so within the context of a national depopulation crisis caused by the confluence of low birth rates, the rise of international tensions, and the tragedy of the First World War. While her support spread across social classes, strong political resistance to her message revealed deeply conservative precepts about gender which were grounded in French identity itself. In this thoughtful and provocative study, Elinor Accampo follows Roussel's life from her youth, marriage, speaking career, motherhood, and political activism to her decline and death from tuberculosis in the years following World War I. She tells the story of a woman whose life and work spanned a historical moment when womanhood was being redefined by the acceptance of a woman's sexuality as distinct from her biological, reproductive role -- a development that is still causing controversy today.

Author Biography

Elinor Accampo is a professor of history at the University of Southern California, coeditor of Gender and the Politics of Social Reform in France, 1870--1914 and author of Industrialization, Family, and Class Relations: Saint Chamond, 1815--1914.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Introduction: Nelly Roussel, "Contemporary of the Future"	4	(9)
1 Conversion Experiences	13	(22)
2 Mother and Missionary: The Ideological Foundations of an Unorthodox Feminism	35	(35)
3 The Making and Marketing of a Spectacular Apostle	70	(29)
4 The Public and Private Politics of Female Self-Sacrifice: Audience Reception	99	(36)
5 Pathologies and Persecutions	135	(36)
6 The Great War: Pacifism, Censorship, and the Disease of a "Weary, Wounded Heart"	171	(34)
7 Last Battles: Words of Combat, Hope, and Pain	205	(34)
Epilogue	239	(12)
Notes	251	(40)
Bibliography	291	(12)
Index	303