Dena GOODMAN (dir.)
New York and London: Routledge, 2003
Marie-Antoinette: Writings on the Body of a Queen brings together a body of critical and feminist essays that redefine the historical understanding of Marie-Antoinette and the monarchy and revolution in which she figured prominently. It is also meant to serve as an introduction to feminist and gender analysis for the many students who are fascinated by Marie-Antoinette, and as an alternative and corrective to the popular biographies that continue to attract readers among the general public. Thus, for historians and teachers of French history, this book will bring feminist scholarship and significant new interpretations of Marie-Antoinette into their understanding and teaching of the Old Regime and French Revolution. For teachers and students of women’s history and gender and sexuality studies, this book presents an attractive and compelling topic for exploring interdisciplinary feminist and gender analysis. For the general public, this is a book that breaks the mold of the traditional biography with a much richer and more complicated picture of Marie-Antoinette, in her times and ours. Recurring themes include: why the queen was the subject of increasingly vicious pornographic attacks, accusing her of sexual profligacy with both men and women; the importance of her gender and nationality in constructions of her identity as treasonous "other;" the role of developing gender norms and gender and anxieties in popular, public, and political representations of her; the continuing uses of Marie-Antoinette in popular and political culture up to the present day. The many illustrations, ranging from royal portraits to pornographic engravings and twentieth-century magazine covers, both enrich the analysis and serve as an additional essay that will allow readers to explore on their own the questions raised in the text about representation, gender, sexuality, and power.
Notamment :
– Dena GOODMAN, "Not Another Biography of Marie Antoinette!";
– Larry WOLFF, "Hapsburg Letters: The Disciplinary Dynamics of Epistolary Narrative in the Correspondence of Maria Theresa and Marie-Antoinette";
– Mary D. SHERIFF, "The Portrait of the Queen";
– Sarah MAZA, "The Diamond Necklace Affair Revisited (1785-1786): The Case of the Missing Queen;
– Chantal THOMAS, "The Heroine of the Crime: Marie-Antoinette in Pamphlets";
– Lynn HUNT, "The Many Bodies of Marie-Antoinette: Political Pornography and the Problem of the Feminine in the French Revolution";
– Elizabeth COLWILL, "Pass as a Woman, Act Like a Man: Marie-Antoinette as Tribade in the Pornography of the French Revolution";
– Thomas E. KAISER, "Ambiguous Identities: Marie-Antoinette and the House of Lorraine from the Affair of the Minuet to Lambesc’s Charge " ;
– Terry CASTLE, "Marie-Antoinette Obsession";
– Laura MASON, ""We’re Just Little People, Louis": Marie-Antoinette on Film";
– Pierre SAINT-AMAND, "Terrorizing Marie-Antoinette",
– Susan S. LANSER "Eating Cake: The (Ab)uses of Marie-Antoinette".