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FEMALE PYGMALION FIGURES IN FRENCH LITERATURE
by

Vicki Lee DeVries

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulﬁllment of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Department of French, Classics, and Italian

2006

 

ABSTRACT
FEMALE PYGMALION FIGURES IN FRENCH LITERATURE
By

Vicki Lee DeVries

Ovid’s Pygmalion in Metamorphoses X creates a lover without the faults of the
women of his society. Throughout French literature, female Pygmalion ﬁgures have
sought to do the same. Antoine de la Sale’s Petit Jehan de Saintre’, Marguerite de
Navarre’s Heptaméron 26, Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions, Honoré de Balzac’s
Lys dans la Vallée, George Sand’s Francois 1e Champi, Rachilde’s Monsieur Ve'nus, and
Colette’s Che’ri and Fin de Che'ri examine gender-reversed Pygmalion-Galatea
relationships. The problems to be circumvented and the lover’s consequent form vary as
the story moves from one historical setting to another. Because these female sculptors
are working not in marble but in the medimn of another human being, French and
Raven’s seminal 1959 study on the bases of power in interpersonal relationships serves as
a valuable tool for critical analysis of these texts.

Antoine de la Sale’s Madame des Belles Cousines proﬁts from her status as a
wealthy widow to exercise an impressive array of bases of power to turn a naive page
into one of France’s greatest knights. However, as he gains experience and prestige, he
counterbalances his mentor’s power, prompting her to reject him in favor of an abbot
who cannot threaten her independence.

Marguerite de Navarre and Honoré de Balzac tell tales of virtuous women who
attempt to form lovers who will adore them without the expectation of physical intimacy.

The success of these projects would enable them to pursue relationships with men they

love while preserving their chastity. Both the lady of Pamplona and Henriette de
Mortsauf make signiﬁcant progress in their undertakings, but the ﬁnal transformation is
completed only through their deaths.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Madame de Warens and George Sand’s Madeleine
Blanchet represent maternal Pygmalion ﬁgures and focus attention on the question of
incest in such relationships. The power imbalance in Rousseau’s relationship with his
Maman renders it exploitative, while George Sand’s careful differentiation of the mother-
son relationship from the love between a woman and a man permits the only happy
resolution in this study.

Rachilde and Colette portray female Pygmalion ﬁgures who create and destroy
their Galateas. Raoule de Vénérande attempts the formation of a beautiful, gender-
ﬂexible lover who mirrors her own androgynous tendencies, but kills him when he
attempts a homosexual inﬁdelity. Léa de Lonval maintains her physically perfect lover in
a state of perpetual adolescence, reﬂecting back her own desirability even as she
approaches the age of ﬁfty. Once Le’a recognizes and accepts her aging, demonstrated to
her by Che'ri’s gaze, she releases him, successfully negotiating the transition to old age.
However, Che’ri cannot ﬁnd happiness without her, ﬁnally committing suicide.

These female Pygmalion ﬁgures wrestle with many of the same issues despite the
differences in period and the author’s gender. A comparison of texts by male and female
authors demonstrates a shift from male adolescent fantasizing to a real attempt to
confront the issues women face in their relationships with men. The application of
French and Raven’s theory demonstrates the important of the balance of power in any

successful relationship.

 

Copyright by
Vicki Lee DeVries
2006

To E.K. and E. C.,
who did not see the end of this project,
but who always believed I could ﬁnish it.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I owe the successful completion of this doctoral program to support from many
sources. I want to thank the French faculty for their encouragement and inspiration,
especially Professor Ehsan Ahmed, who chaired my doctoral committee, and Julia
Holdemess and Anna Norris, who served on my dissertation committee. My deepest
academic debt is to my dissertation director, Prof. Laurence M. Porter, whose insights
and advice on everything from choosing a topic to choosing the right word have
signiﬁcantly improved the quality of my work. I plan to remain a recipient of his wisdom
for years to come.

I would also like to thank the Global Literary and Cultural Studies research
cluster at Michigan State for their ﬁnancial support through the fellowship that enabled
me to complete the dissertation in less time than would otherwise have been possible.

Finally, and most importantly, thank you to my husband, Kyle, and my sons,
Carsten and Curran, both for their often-tested patience and for their ability to remind me

that there is much more to life than a dissertation.

vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Love’s Formative Power .................................................................................................... 1
CHAPTER 1

Le Petit Jehan de Saintré: Pygmalion’s Power Won and Lost ........................................ 13
CHAPTER 2

Transformation through self-sacriﬁce: Heptaméron 26 and the Lys dans la vallée ........ 37
CHAPTER 3

Pygmalion’s Fall and Redemption: Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions and George
Sand’s F rancois le champi ............................................................................................... 74
CHAPTER 4

Monsieur Vénus and Chéri: The Creation, Adoration, and Destruction of the Male
Object ............................................................................................................................. 120
CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 160
NOTES .......................................................................................................................... 169
WORKS CITED ............................................................................................................ 184

vii

Introduction
Love’s Formative Power

The story of Pygmalion has long captured the imagination of both readers and
writers. The fantasy of creating or shaping another individual to ﬁt one’s exact
speciﬁcations is a powerful one, inspiring works ranging in period, style, and quality
from Jean de Meung’s retelling as an episode in the Roman de la Rose to Shaw’s
Pygmalion to the ﬁlms Educating Rita and Weird Science. In the earliest known version
of Pygmalion, a version known only through references made by Clement of Alexandria
and Amobius, Philostephanus tells the story of a man, the king of Cyprus by one account,
who falls in love with a statue of Venus (J .M. Miller 205). Ovid retains Cyprus as the
setting, but transforms Pygmalion into the sculptor of his love object in the best-known
and oldest extant version of the myth.

Orpheus, whose own story begins book ten, is the inscribed narrator of
Pygmalion’s tale. A victim of love himself, he relates stories that show the consequences
of winning Venus’s favor or inciting her wrath. After relating the story of the
Propoetides, women who, Ovid tells us, denied the divinity of Venus and were turned to
stone as a reﬂection of their hard-heartedness, Orpheus begins the story of Pygmalion.
Disgusted by the immorality of the women he sees around him, Pygmalion resolves not
to marry. Instead, he directs his energies into the sculpting of a maiden more beautiful
than any woman ever born, a reference Jane Miller takes to be suggestive of the link in
identity between Galatea and Venus herself (206). When the statue is completed,
Pygmalion falls hopelessly in love with her, bringing her gifts, dressing her in clothing,

and taking her to bed with him. He kisses her and touches her, unwilling to believe that

she is indeed made of ivory, but she remains cool beneath his touch. Only when he
makes an offering to Venus is his impossible wish fulﬁlled and his creation transformed
into a living woman.

This curious relationship between creator and creation has left its mark on
Western literature, both in the new, original works it has inspired and in literary criticism.
The motif surfaces in authors as diverse as Shakespeare, Steinbeck, Chaucer, Hoffman,
Poe, and Diderot. Although Dorrie argues that the Pygmalion story is not an archetype,
due to the changing responses it has elicited from different generations (J .M. Miller 208),
its recurrence in Western literature suggests that this story strikes a chord that continues
to resonate. Many versions of Pygmalion occur in French literature. Jean de Meung
retells the story of Pygmalion in the Roman de la Rose, it appears in Ovide moralisé in
the 14th century, and becomes a dramatic sketch by Rousseau. Many other works, while
they do not retell the story itself, keep the motifs of attraction and transformation. A
subset of these looser interpretations retains the central ﬁgures of the Pygmalion myth but
reverses their gender, resulting in a female Pygmalion who shapes and desires a male
Galatea. While these texts were not likely written expressly as versions of the Pygmalion
myth in the same way that Shaw wrote his Pygmalion, the Pygmalion story serves as
another lens through which to view some classic texts.

G.S. Kirk points out that one of the key aspects of the mythical imagination is
that it involves fantasy (268). Pygmalion’s story describes the fulﬁllment of two
powerful fantasies. First, he creates his own ideal lover, who is everything he wants her
to be and nothing he does not. She in no way resembles the women he sees around him,

and in fact, is their antithesis. The ﬁrst “action” she takes is that of blushing, the capacity

for which the Propoetides had lost, an indicator of their utter immorality. Secondly,
Pygmalion has the good fortune to have his fondest and most impossible wish magically
fulﬁlled by a benevolent deity. This desire for something unattainable, though in most
cases the object of desire remains beyond reach rather than being bestowed
supernaturally upon the protagonist, is reﬂected in many of the texts to be examined in
this project. A particular impossible desire reﬂected obliquely in Pygmalion, but noted
by J. Hillis Miller among others is the narcissictic quality of falling in love with one’s
own creation (4, 5). This quality is clearly seen in works like E.T.A. Hoffman’s “The
Sandman”, Germaine de Sta'e‘l’s Le Mannequin, and Eve future by Villiers de L’Isle
Adam. In the ﬁrst two works, the male protagonists ﬁnd the women they choose, an
automaton and a dummy, respectively, to be captivating precisely because they do
nothing more than reﬂect back the ideas and opinions of their suitors. Thus, the problem
of narcissism in the relationships to be examined will be an important one.

Incest is another issue raised by Pygmalion’s story. The language used to
describe Galatea’s awakening is the same to describe the birth of a child. She sees the
sky and her lover, instead of her mother, at the same time. As the one who brought her
into the world, Pygmalion is usurping the role of mother, an important turn of events that
we will return to shortly. By wedding his “child”, Pygmalion commits incest. He
himself escapes the consequences of this act, but his great granddaughter, Myrrah, pays
the price for his Sin. She falls passionately in love with her father, Cinyras, and refuses to
take another man as her husband. The only way she sees out of her crime is suicide, but
she is stopped in the attempt by her nurse, who helps her trick her father into sleeping

with her. When Cinyras discovers what she has done, she ﬂees for her life, pregnant with

her father’s child. After Myrrah is transformed into a tree, Adonis is born, the man who
will unwittingly avenge the criminal passion his mother felt. Accidentally grazed by
Cupid’s arrow, Venus falls in love with Adonis, a child so beautiful that he looked just
like her own son, minus the quiver. Adonis’s death brings grief to Venus, and thus She
pays for Myrrah’s suffering.

The relationships to follow are most often between an older woman and a younger
man. Because, like Pygmalion, the female protagonist Shapes her protégé, making him in
the image she desires for him, the suggestion of incest has to be considered. In some
cases, the older woman is clearly viewed as a maternal ﬁgure, bringing the problem of
incest to the fore, while in others it remains subtler.

The problems of incest, unattainable desire, and narcissism are found in varying
degrees in the texts to be examined. But the common thread running through all of them
is that of transformation. Ovid chose Metamorphoses as his title as it is this motif that
unites all his tales. Pygmalion’s story is unusual in that it relates a metamorphosis from
lifelessness to living, rather than from human form to an intermediate stage between life
and death (J .H. Miller 3). So, too, the versions of Pygmalion created by later writers all
involve transformation. Unlike Pygmalion, the protagonists in these stories do not
literally sculpt their love interests from ivory, but instead use inﬂuence to effect the
changes they desire.

To achieve their ends, female Pygmalion ﬁgures must exert signiﬁcant inﬂuence
over the young men they are involved with. The discipline of social psychology can
clarify the projects dramatized but not explicitly interpreted by reverse Pygmalion stories.

Since the 1950’s, social psychology has studied the ways one person inﬂuences another.

Early studies examine interactions between strangers or colleagues (Kelman, 1952;
French and Raven, 1959), but more recently, researchers have been examining the
methods of inﬂuence used and the motivations for accepting the inﬂuence of another in
close relationships (Oriﬁa, Wood and Simpson, 2002; Drigotas, Rusbult, Wieselquist, and
Whitton, 1999).

In his analysis of inﬂuence tactics in ﬁve plays, social psychologist David Kipnis
suggests that a connection between literature and the social sciences may beneﬁt both
areas of study. Not that social psychology will illurnine any and every text. In a seminal
study of Shakespeare, Stanley Fish warns against the dangers of distorting literary
analysis with misapplied social science theories. However, as in his own use of Speech
Act theory to analyze Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, social pychology’s insight into
inﬂuence strategies ﬁts the Pygmalion motif. Just as Coriolanus is about speech acts, so
Pygmalion stories are about the inﬂuence of one individual on another. Social
psychology will not answer all the questions raised by these texts, but it should make an
important contribution toward understanding how inﬂuence operates as coercive and
consenting parties interact.

French and Raven’s 1959 study on the bases of social power identiﬁed ﬁve:
reward, coercive, legitimate, referent, and expert power. Raven later identiﬁed a sixth
basis, informational power. Building on or reacting to this classic study, researchers have
gone on to examine the actual implementation of the power an individual holds by
identifying several tactics or strategies of inﬂuence. Kipnis groups inﬂuence tactics into
three categories: strong, weak, and rational, a grouping that has proved useful in the

analysis of inﬂuence strategies (Howard et al.). Strong tactics include claims to superior

knowledge, direct assertion of authority, insistence, and threats. Weak tactics include
ﬂattery, manipulation, hinting, pleading, and crying. Rational tactics are characterized by
simple, direct requests, the use of reason, and compromise. In his analysis of ﬁve plays,
Kipnis discusses not only types of tactics, but also identiﬁes two reasons for exerting
inﬂuence. First, proactive reasons are inﬂuence attempts to satisfy a need or want by
causing a new action in others. Reactive reasons, conversely, are attempts to stop others
from bothering the protagonist. By analyzing the number of inﬂuence attempts, the
reason for inﬂuence, and the nature of the attempt, Kipnis makes insightful observations
into the literary texts he examines. By applying a similar method, I hope to do the same.

Much research in interpersonal inﬂuence has noted gender differences in the
bases of power and the strategies used, though much has been made of the fact that
differences could stem primarily from the power differences between men and women
rather than from explicit gender differences. In reverse Pygmalion texts, the women
necessarily hold more power than the men, whether it is power based on higher social
standing, greater wealth, independence, or knowledge. Given this situation, many
researchers would hypothesize that when rational inﬂuence attempts fail, these women
should be more likely to use strong tactics rather than weak. Whether this proves to be
the case or whether these strong women rely on weak tactics in spite of their higher
relative power could provide important insights into the bases of power available to
women, as well as the legitimacy of that power.

If Pygmalion is, in a sense, usurping a woman’s role as the giver of life and the
principal inﬂuence on a young child, why employ a double reversal to hold together the

texts in question? Why not just undo Pygmalion’s inversion and go back to the original?

There is some merit to this suggestion, and another mythical tradition to draw on. Part of
the role these female protagonists play has much in common with that of the goddess
Natura, a tradition rooted in the Middle Ages. While this ﬁgure does not capture the
important element of falling in love with one’s own creation, she does bear examination.

In The Goddess Natura in Medieval Literature, George Economou traces the
development of Natura from her roots in classical philosophy and poetry into the Middle
Ages. For the philosophers, who include Plato and Artistotle, Nature is an intermediary
between the world-soul and matter. She rules the sublunary world, ensuring the
continuity and preservation of life through procreation, and is directly subordinate to the
mind and will of God. For the Roman poets, Natura remains an intermediary between the
heavens and earth, acting as an ordering, creative principle, but her role reamins fairly
undeﬁned in comparison to what She becomes with the medieval poets.

Bernard Silvestris did much to illuminate Natura’s character in his De mundi
universitate, but the author who contributed most to the development of Natura in the
Middle Ages was Alain de Lille (Economou 72). She is the central ﬁgure in his two most
famous literary works, De Planctu Naturae and Anticlaudianus. The Anticlaudianus is of
particular interest in our case because in it, Natura takes on the task of creating a New
Man, one who is perfect in every way and who will thus atone for Natura’s earlier,
ﬂawed creations.

The Anticlaudianus is a Christian philosophical epic, with Phronesis as its hero.
Natura decides, with the agreement of her sisters, the Virtues, to create a New Man.
While all the Virtues agree that this is a worthy project and agree to participate in any

way they can, Phronesis points out that, while Natura and the Virtues can create a

physical form for the New Man, they cannot create a soul. She hesitates to begin a
project that may not be completed. But Reason convinces the group that if they ask
God’s help by sending an ambassador to him to ask for a soul, he will grant their request.
After some hesitation, Prudence agrees to the will of her sisters and begins the journey to
heaven to ask God for a soul to complete the New Man. She completes her quest with
the successive aid of Reason and the senses, Theology, and Faith, returning to Natura
with the soul God has created expressly for their project. At this point, Natura forms the
body for the New Man out of the best matter has to offer. Concord unites the soul sent
from God to the body created by Natura, and then each of the Virtues in turn grants her
gifts to the New Man. The teachings offered cover everything from how to keep his hair
and how to walk to how to be a good, faithful friend and leader. The tone of this passage
lends weight to Wilk’s hypothesis that the Anticlaudianus was written for Philip II of
France, thus serving as a text for princely education and a political allegory as well as a
religious and philosophical one. Once the New Man is created, he battles Allecto and her
band of Vices, ultimately defeating them and restoring Natura’s realm to her.

This work resembles the Pygmalion story and the rest of the works to be studied
in several important ways. First, Natura cannot create the New Man ex nihilo, but must
work with existing matter, just as Pygmalion begins with a piece of ivory and the female
Pygmalions begin a step further away from creation with a living, breathing human
being. For Natura and Pygmalion, divine intervention is required to complete the
creation. The work of the female protagonists of later writers resembles more closely
that of the Virtues, who, rather than shaping his physical form, shape his character.

However, the focus of the Anticlaudianus is not on the relationship between the creator(s)

and this particular creation, but on the epic quest for knowledge and the redemption of
Natura’s work as a whole. Natura and the Virtues are female models of creative power
that could inﬂuence later texts in addition to the Pygmalion motif.

The element the Pygmalion myth adds to Alain de Lille’s creation myth is the
attraction between the artist and his or her work. This attraction manifests itself later in
medieval French literature, along with an individualized rather than allegorical female
Pygmalion in Antoine de la Sale’s Le Petit Jehan de Saintré, written in 1459. In this text,
a young widow transforms a boy into a respected knight. After careful observation of all
the boys in the king’s court, she chooses Jehan as her project, apparently undertaken
primarily to occupy herself. She is successful and happy until Saintré demonstrates his
independence by undertaking a quest of his own choosing. The lady, realizing she has
lost her absolute power over him, abandons the game and rejects Saintré.

For the lady of Pampelune in Marguerite de Navarre’s Heptaméron 26 (1558)
virtue is the quality to be nurtured in the young Seigneur d’Avannes, with whom she is
smitten. Cultivating virtue in her protégé is the only means available to this virtuous
woman to keep him close to her. Her ﬁdelity to her husband is unshakeable, but by
turning d’Avannes away from his growing taste for other, less virtuous women, she can
continue and deepen their relationship. Honoré de Balzac expands and retells
Marguerite’s story in his Lys dans la Valle’e (1837). Fe’lix de Vandenesse never succeeds
in seducing Mme de Mortsauf, but they relate to each other on two levels. Henriette
loves Félix and conﬁdes in him as she would a lover, but her commitment to her virtue as

a means of insulation from her husband’s irrational behavior prevents her from acting on

her feelings. By attempting to foster this same virtue in F élix, she keeps him close
without allowing him to threaten her virtue.

The male Galatea ﬁgures in Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions (1770) and
George Sand’s Francois le champi (1847, 8) both grew up with absent or distant mothers.
In their cases, part of the attraction to the female Pygmalion who shapes and changes
them is her appeal as the warm, caring mother they never had. While the problem of
incest is raised already in Ovid’s version by Pygmalion’s great granddaughter, the
relationships between the maternal ﬁgures of Mme de Warens and Madeleine Blanchet
and their respective“sons” bring it more clearly into focus. Rousseau refers to Mme de
Warens as Maman and he is her Petit. When their relationship becomes sexual, he
himself admits to feeling as though he were committing incest. Motherly love prevents
Madeleine Blanchet from seeing F rancois’s romantic love for her. When she ﬁnally
realizes how he feels, she blushes and is left speechless. Sand’s careful treatment of her
characters and their situation permits a happy and virtuous resolution, yet the elements of
incestuous desire remain. Both of these relationships thus blend maternal and ﬁlial love
with erotic love in such a way that the question of incest cannot be ignored.

Rachilde’s Monsieur Vénus differs signiﬁcantly from the previous texts because it
depicts the consequences of transformation as intensely negative for the young man, who
becomes its victim. Raoule de Vénérande rescues Jacques Silvert from poverty, but her
inﬂuence eventually robs him of his masculinity and then, consequently, his life. For
Jacques, the original story’s path of transformation from statue to animate being is
reversed. He begins as a living human being but ends as a mechanical doll, the result of

inﬂuence that is ultimately destructive. Raoule illustrates that female Pygmalions are not

10

always intent on the improvement of their Galateas, but can use them in ways that serve
their own decadent ends.

Colette’s Chéri tells a somewhat similar story of a relationship undertaken with
the primary goal of pleasure. However, the harm Le’a inﬂicts is not intentional. Le’a
attains her goal of bringing pleasure to them both, but when Chéri marries and their
relationship ends, she realizes that she has indeed harmed him. Instead of thinking of his
future and preparing him for manhood, she has reveled in the present and kept him too
long. At twenty-ﬁve, Chéri is frivolous, spoiled, and unprepared for the responsibilities
of marriage and fatherhood. While Léa resembles other female Pygmalions in her
inﬂuence on Chéri, she can be categorized as neither a saint nor a devil. By moving
away from traditional female roles of a knight’s lady, a reservoir of virtue, a loving
mother, or a femme fatale, Colette renders Léa the most human of the female Pygmalion
ﬁgures.

The recurrence of relationships between a female Pygmalion and a male Galatea
across eight centuries suggests that this story raises issues of importance not only to the
writers and readers of earlier times, but also to us today, notably the balance of power in
relationships. In Western culture, males are assigned the role of subject and females the
role of object by default. Female Pygmalion ﬁgures challenge this assumption, opening
explorations into what happens when power shifts from male to female. The degree,
permanence, and outcomes of such shifts illuminate society’s underlying attitudes toward
the consequences of women’s power.

Women playing the role of subject focus attention on the expression of female

desire. The socially acceptable means of expressing desire that are available to a female

11

subject, the adequacy of those means, and the consequences of stepping beyond them will
be explored, as well as the changes that occur in the literary responses to each of these
issues as we move from the Middle Ages to the present. This study examines changing
perceptions of women’s roles and capacities in general, as well as the authors’

commentaries on and critiques of these roles.

12

Chapter 1
Le Petit Jehan de Saintré: Pygmalion’s Power Won and Lost

Stories about the creation of a new being rarely end well. Texts ranging from the
Genesis account of the garden of Eden to Frankenstein and his monster to 2001 A Space
Odyssey relate the careful dedication of the creator to the work of creation and the
ensuing disaster when the creation slips from the creator’s control and asserts its
independence, forcing either a dissolution or redeﬁnition of the relationship between
creator and creation. Le Petit Jehan de Saintré by Antoine de la Sale relates such a story.
Although the “belle dame des Belles Cousines” does not create new life, she transforms a
young page into “le plus vaillant Chevalier de France” through careful attention,
education, and social promotion. Unlike many creators, however, she falls in love with
her creation. This element aligns Madame des Belles Cousines with another famous
creator, Pygmalion.

The parallels between Le Petit Jehan de Saintré and the Pygmalion story have
been cited by Clifton Cherpack as a means to reconcile the seemingly disjointed parts of
the text, a question that sparked earlier critical debate.l Critics largely agree now that the
joining of the two parts does not constitute an artistic ﬂaw, but a hybridization of genres
that reﬂects the literary and social changes of the ﬁfteenth century. Whether the text is
serious or satirical remains open to discussion.2

But viewing Madame des Belles Cousines as a Pygmalion ﬁgure has more to
offer than a unifying framework. The importance of power and control in the
relationship between Madame des Belles Cousines and Saintré comes to the forefront as

the parallels between the two stories are examined. In the Pygmalion myth, the question

13

of control is key. When Pygmalion looks at the women around him, the Propoetides, he
sees women who are out of control. They lack morality and have become completely
shameless. As Ovid writes, the metamorphosis they undergo, changing from ﬂesh to
stone, is not a large one. Because of these uncontrolled women, Pygmalion vows never
to marry, and directs his energies instead to his new statue. Here, he is in complete
control. He shapes the ivory until he achieves exactly what he wants. But Pygmalion’s
own skill betrays him, “ars adeo latet arte sua”(X.252), blurring the line between art and
life. The statue is so perfectly beautiful that She escapes his control and, though she is
inanimate, controls him as he becomes obsessed with his creation. When Pygmalion
prays to Venus, he is praying not only for the fulﬁllment of a wish so dear he dares not
express it directly, but also for a restoration of his own power. If the statue is
transformed into a woman, a metamorphosis that ﬁguratively undoes that of the
Propoetides, Pygamlion will no longer be controlled by a truly insatiable desire. He will
take his ivory maid as his wife, touch her, kiss her, and make love to her, and she will
respond, fulﬁlling both his erotic desire and his desire for control. But the control that
Pygmalion exerts over Galatea extends beyond that of the average Roman husband over
his wife, for he is not only her husband, but her creator (Miller 208).

A Similar dynamic of shifting control plays out in Le Petit Jehan de Saintré.
However, since the medium in which Madame des Belles Cousines works is not ivory,
but the character of a human being, the control She exerts initially is not a given. The
ﬁeld of social psychology, particularly theories on inﬂuence strategies and bases of
power, provides a framework for a detailed analysis of Madame des Belles Cousine’s

power over Saintré and how that power changes as their relationship develops.

l4

For an agent to inﬂuence the behavior of another, the target, the agent must hold
the power necessary to effect change. In 1959, French and Raven outlined a taxonomy
identifying ﬁve bases of social power. A sixth was added in 1965. Coercive power , or
the threat of punishment, can be either impersonal, such as the threat of losing one’s job,
or personal, in that the agent will dislike the target or impose other personal sanctions.
Reward power stems from the ability to promise compensation if the target conforms to
the agent’s request. Legitimate power is drawn ﬁom one’s right to inﬂuence. In 1992
and 1993, Raven ﬁne-tuned this basis of power, dividing it into 4 subcategories. In an
organizational setting, legitimate power is often the power of legitimate position, in
which the agent’s power is based on his or her higher rank with respect to the target.
Legitimate power also manifests itself as legitimate reciprocity. In this case, the agent
can expect the target to comply with his or her wishes becauSe the agent has helped the
target in the past. Legitimate equity is closely related. Here, the agent expects the target
to comply in order to compensate the agent either for the agent’s hard work, or for
damage done to the agent by the target. Finally, the power of legitimate dependence, also
known as the power of the powerless, dervies from the agent’s right to expect to be taken
care of by the target.

The three remaining bases of power are expert, referent, and informational power.
Expert power derives from the agent’s superior knowledge. Referent power is based on
the target’s desire to achieve or maintain a close relationship with the agent.
Informational power, added in 1965, has also been termed persuasiveness or rational
persuasion by other researchers. Informational power is derived from the ability to offer

any perspective or knowledge that may change the behavior of a target.

15

As we examine the relationship between Madame des Belles Cousines and Saintré
in light of this taxonomy, it becomes clear that she wields a great deal of power over
Jehan. The ﬁrst basis of power she invokes is that of legitimate position. Madame des
Belles Cousines is of royal blood and the constant companion of the queen. Saintré,
though noble as well, is the son of a vassal to the royal family. In addition to his
somewhat lesser nobility, he is only thirteen, old enough only to serve as a page. Rules
of courtly conduct would therefore demand that he obey any orders from any lady.
Madame des Belles Cousines augments this power with coercive power, threatening
Saintré with humiliation and loss of face as she ridicules his ignorance of love.

However, Madame des Belles Cousines quickly balances these fairly negative
powers by demonstrating to Saintré her power to reward him for his compliance. In her
long didactic monologue, she enumerates the benEﬁts that come to a true lover who seeks
to please his lady. She begins with spiritual beneﬁts, demonstrating how serving a lady
well will protect the lover from the seven deadly sins. But, she points out, there are
corporeal beneﬁts as well, stemming from the fact that a true lady will see to it that all of
her serviteur’s needs are met. Madame des Belles Cousines has hinted at this aspect of
love before. When Saintré, under duress, names Matheline de Coursy as his lady,
Madame des Belles Cousines scoffs, not because Matheline is unworthy due to her rank
or beauty, but because she is ten years old, and not in a position to beneﬁt Saintré. She
explains, “Sire, devez vous choisir dame qui soit de hault et noble sang, saige, et qui ait
de quoy vous aidier, et mectre sus a voz besoings” (16). If the young man in question

happens to be a knight or squire by profession, he stands to gain additional physical

l6

beneﬁts, as the true lover who seeks to please his lady will never go into battle
unprepared, but will be well-conditioned and have the best arms.

When Saintré says he is willing to serve her, Madame des Belles Cousines
upholds the responsibilities she has told Saintré a lady has, promising him not only the
fairly distant and abstract rewards she has discussed before, but by rewarding him more
immediately and concretely with a silk purse containing twelve e'cus. She promises more
to follow if he handles this ﬁrst sum wisely. Saintré’s reaction demonstrates the sway
this particular basis of power holds over him. “[L]ors tira la boursse de sa manche et la
desveloppa ct regarda. Et quant il la vist si belle, et les xij escus dedens, n’est pas a
doubter se i1 en fut content ; lors commenca en son cuer la joye telle qu’il ne pensoit pas
estre mains riche que le my” (51). Intentionally or inadvertently, Madame des Belles
Cousines has discovered the most effective reward for Saintré at this stage of his
development. He is not ﬁlled with joy at the prospect of serving one of the noblest ladies
in Jehan and Belle’s court, but by the small silk purse ﬁlled with her money.

Madame des Belles Cousines has more to offer than the ﬁnancial resources
necessary to meet Saintré’s needs. Like the hypothetical lady she suggested to Saintré,
she is “de hault et noble sang, [et] saige”. These qualities endow her with expert power
in addition to the legitimate position, coercive, and reward powers she already possesses.
Being of royal blood, Madame des Belles Cousines is well-connected at court. She
knows everyone, and uses her knowledge of their characters to both Saintré’s and her
own advantage. She masterfully manipulates the court gossips, Jehan de Soussy et
Thibault de Roussy, in order to avoid any suspicion that she and Saintré are involved. As

She prepares to amuse herself once again by interrogating Saintré about his lady, she

17

invites them to join her. Once again She lambastes Saintré for not having chosen a lady
to serve, though this time Saintré is playing along. She harasses him so mercilessly that
when everyone leaves, Soussy and Roussy praise Saintré and complain about Madame
des Belles Cousines’s harshness. Then, just as she anticipated, they spread the news of
the encounter everywhere, dispelling any suspicion that may otherwise arise : “Et par
ainsin demoura ceste loyale et bonne amour secrete jusques a ce que Fortune, par sa
variableté leur voult 1e doz tourner...” (64). Madame des Belles Cousines also
manipulates the ladies of her entourage in a similar fashion and regularly piques the
queen’s curiosity in order to safely satisfy her own.

Some critics have regarded Madame des Belles Cousines’s manipulation of those
around her as deceitful, proof that the decadent, lusty woman we see in the second part of
the text has not changed her spots, just stopped camouﬂaging them so well’. But the
narrator, as can be seen in the citation above, does not pass judgment on Madame des
Belles Cousines for her desire to keep her love a secret. This desire motivates all her
deceptions and manipulations in the ﬁrst part of the text, and for this she should not be
criticized. Secrecy is one of the conditions of courtly love. Madame des Belles Cousines
swears Saintré to absolute secrecy, as do the Chatelaine de Vergy and the lady in
Christine de Pisan’s Duc des Vrais Amants with their prospective lovers. In this context,
dissimulation is not a fault, but a virtue. Madame des Belles Cousines’s later affair with
Damp Abbé supports this view. Her lack of effort to hide their relationship, whether
from her ladies, the queen’s messenger, or Saintré himself, underscores its decidedly

uncourtly nature.

18

Madame des Belles Cousines’s expert power extends beyond her knowledge of
the character of speciﬁc individuals. Her insights into the workings of the court prove
useful to Saintré as well. As he gains favor with the king and queen, Madame des Belles
Cousines quickly takes steps to prevent his undermining by “1e faulz parler des envieux”
(71). She grants Saintré a reward power of his own, ﬁnancing the gifts she recommends
he give to everyone, “Et par ainsin, au regart de vostre largesse, honneur, grace et amour
de chascun seront avecques vous” (72).

She further strenghtens her expertise with extensive knowlege of both the Bible
and classical authors. Her didactic treatise is ﬁlled with citations from Socrates, Seneca,
Epicurus, Plato and several classical historians, as well as from saints Augustine and
Bernard. Biblical passages round out the authority on which this facet of her expert
power rests. As noted by Karl Uitti, the voice of the précepteur to the sons of princes is
undoubtedly heard here, especially when one considers that the work is dedicated to
Jehan d’Anjou, one of Antoine de la Sale’s former pupils (138). La Sale’s choice of
Madame des Belles Cousines as his mouthpiece places her ﬁrmly in a position parallel to
his own, a position which underlines the expert power she exercises over her pupil,
Saintré.

Madame des Belles Cousines’s expert, reward, coercive, and legitimate position
powers are tangible from the beginning of the relationship. As their relationship
develops, however, Madame des Belles Cousines relies less on these harder bases of
power and draws the strength to mold Saintré from what social psychologists consider to

be softer bases, legitimate reciprocity and referent power.

19

 

Saintré himself frequently acknowledges the power of legitimate reciprocity
Madame des Belles Cousines exerts. Each time she sets a new task before him, he
complies, always making reference to the great debt he owes her. When she instructs
him on using gifts to prevent jealousy in the court, he responds in typical fashion.

Jehan de Saintré, qui voit et congnoist les grans biens et les honneurs que

Madame lui fait et pourchasse, ainsin josne qu’il est, a genoulz tres

humblement la remercia disant: « A! ma tresredoubtee dame, la plus

parfaite en tous biens et en tous honneurs qui au monde soit, las! et

comment vous pourray je jamais servir a la milesme partie de ce que vous

suis tenu ? (73)

Because she has been so generous and helpful, Saintré professes to both need and
want to repay her in every way he can.

Finally, Madame des Belles Cousines holds referent power over Saintré. By this
point in their relationship, Saintré has internalized her lessons and is motivated to behave
in a way that will please her, not because he is looking for another gold—filled silk purse
or because he fears she will reject him, but because he wishes to identify himself with her
and to maintain and strengthen their relationship. Referent power works much more
subtly than Madame des Belles Cousines’s other forms of power and results from an
internalization of the values she has inculcated. French and Raven explain that the target
can in some cases be unaware of the referent power an agent exercises(162). Ironically,
Saintré’s motivations for his last emprise, the act that leads to the destruction of his
relationship with Madame des Belles Cousines, most clearly demonstrate the referent

power she holds over him. He says to himself, “Oncques par toy aucun bien d’armes ne

20

fut emprins que ta tresnoble et doulce deesse ne te y ait mis. Ores, vraiement, je me
concluz et delibere que pour l’amour d’elle je veul faire aucun bien.” (228) Saintré does
not mention his desire to repay Madame des Belles Cousines for her generosity, or to
earn her favor. He is spurred to action “pour l’amour d’elle”. Whether his love for
Madame des Belles Cousines is his only motivation remains to be seen, but her referent
power clearly plays a role in Saintré’s decision.

Thus Madame des Belles Cousines unquestionably holds the power necessary to
achieve her goal to “faire d’aucun josne Chevalier ou escuier, un homme renommé” (6),
and proves to have chosen well her piece of ivory from which to sculpt the perfect knight.
Saintré is a quick study, absorbing her lessons and following them to the letter. She thus
completes the first phase of Saintré’s formation, having made of him “un homme de
bien” and feels confident that he is ready to begin the second, to become “renommé”.
Madame des Belles Cousines marks the beginning of this second phase by sending
Saintré out on his ﬁrst emprise. After carrying out her instructions perfectly in the
procurement of the bracelet he will wear as a symbol of his challenge, she puts it on him,
telling him that he is indeed worthy of her prayers and asceticism on his behalf because
“vous estes tel que je veul” (85).

His conduct justifies her conﬁdence. When Saintré first enters Madame des
Belles Cousines’s service, she tells him that when he is older and undertakes feats of
arms, he should recite the traditional blessing of the people of Israel while making the
sign of the cross. He should also hear mass each day before doing anything else. His
behavior in Barcelona reﬂects her teachings. “quant il fut a cheval sur son destrier il

demanda sa bannerole et en ﬁst un grant signe de la croiz en disant sadicte beneisson que

21

Madame lui avoit enseignie” (114). “Saintré, avant que nulle chose feist, eust sa messe
du Sainct Esperit eye, on il se ﬁst donner sa beneisson” (122). He also carries out her
specific instructions on the prizes to be awarded and the gifts to be given, both to his
challenger and to the court where he is a guest.

Saintré’s ﬁrst emprise is an unqualiﬁed victory, both in the outcome of the
tournament and in the honor and respect he earns from this foreign court for his conduct.
But the tournament in Barcelona is only the beginning. By her careful selection of
adventures to undertake, Madame des Belles Cousines builds Saintré’s résumé. Having
procured recognition for him within the court of France, as well as in Spain, Madame des
Belles Cousines arranges for him to take on Loisellench, a Polish challenger who arrives
at Jean’s court. She sends him to the English so that they will know and honor him as
well. Next on the list are two Italians, also defeated by Saintré and his friend Bouciquault.
Saintré completes all of these challenges in perfect knightly fashion, winning, and
occasionally losing, graciously and guarding continuously against the pride Madame des
Belles Cousines has warned him of. His honorable conduct contributes as much to his
reputation as do his knightly feats. In fact, Saintré’s conduct is the primary success that
he and Madame des Belles Cousines can call their own. Some of the challenges Saintré
faces are reminiscent of David and Goliath. Madame des Belles Cousines, the narrator,
and later the king all recognize that much of his success is due to the grace of God, an
attribution underlined by the manner in which he sometimes wins.4

Saintré’s list of knightly accomplishments is now nearly complete. Only one feat
remains: a crusade. By now, the page has grown into a young man and, with the death of

his father, has become the seigneur de Saintré. He is, however, still a squire. Saintré had

22

expressed his wish to become a knight only in the service of the king against the
Saracens. When a trip to Prussia arises, Madame des Belles Cousines sees the
opportunity to complete her work. She sends Saintré out one last time to complete his
honor and achieve her goal. He is knighted and once again returns victorious. Upon his
return, their happiness lasts for ﬁfteen months. Madame des Belles Cousines has
successfully completed her project.

But their happiness is short-lived. Saintré, now a successful, well-favored knight,
takes on a project of his own. Following the example Madame des Belles Cousines set
for him in the undertaking of his ﬁrst emprise, Saintré makes arrangements to set off
again. He designs the banners, clothing, and gage himself, carrying out his plan in the
utmost secrecy. He then gathers the knights and squires who are to accompany him, tells
them his plan, and sends each of them to his lady to ask her leave. But Saintré’s
education is not quite as complete as he and his lady thought, for he has failed to grasp
the vital difference between the emprise Madame des Belles Cousines designed for him
and the one he has prepared himself. A knight must act in the service of his suzerain, a
role fulfilled for Saintré both by his lady and the king. He has failed to ask leave of either
of them until his project is so far underway that he cannot honorably abandon it. In the
case of the first emprise, Saintré goes to the king on the first of May. He has the bracelet
ready, but all the other preparations have yet to be made, preparations which fill the time
from May 1 to July 15, when he ﬁnally leaves for Spain. But Saintré realizes his error
too late. He is so unaware of the consequences of his omission that he does not know
whether Madame des Belles Cousines’s powerful reaction to his announcement stems

from joy or anger (233). His only chance for redemption in her eyes would have been to

23

follow the last command she gives him, “Alez bien tost rompre votre emprinse a voz
compaignons” (234). As a result of his refusal, Madame des Belles Cousines ultimately
holds true to her word, “Jamais tant que je vive de bon cuer ne vous ameray” (233).

Madame des Belles Cousines’ reaction may come as a shock to Saintré as well as
to the reader, but Saintré’s self-determination is likely nearly as shocking to her. This
young man who has always done exactly as she commanded has now not only proposed
an idea of his own, but carried it out without asking her permission or even hinting at his
project. While Saintré may have failed to grasp the importance of his role in service of
his lady and king, Madame des Belles Cousines has failed to see how her careful
advancement and elevation of Saintré has eroded the bases of power from which she
draws her authority.

Over the course of their relationship, Saintré has evolved from a thirteen-year-old
page to a 29-year-old knight and lord. Madame des Belles Cousines has worked
tirelessly to ensure the favor of the king for Saintré and to build him an impeccable
reputation within the court, in France, and in the rest of Christendom. Her success is
complete, but as Saintré has climbed the social ladder, gaining prestige and standing, the
gap between them has narrowed. Madame des Belles Cousines is still a member of the
extended royal family, but Saintré, both by birth and by merit, has gained considerable
status, and is no longer obligated to acquiesce to her whims or commands. She herself is
not unaware of the change, which is notable in the changing manner in which she
addresses him as the story progresses. However, she fails to recognize the implications.

During their ﬁrst encounter, she calls him maistre, a term Taylor notes as highly

derogatory (260), or sire, which when addressed to a thirteen-year-old can only be ironic,

24

and issues series of commands in the imperative. “Or ca, maistre, passez et vous mectez
devant” (6). Once she has taken Saintré into her service and begins his formal education,
all her requirements of him are prefaced by the phrase, “je veul et vous commande” or by
a close variant. The twelve—page passage where Madame des Belles Cousines lays out
her expectations of Saintré now that he has become her serviteur, contains 25 instances of
this phrase. This passage, in contrast with the passages containing advice that Madame
des Belles Cousines dispensed before she revealed her intentions to Saintré, highlights
the position power that she draws from being Saintré’s lady, in addition to the position
power granted by her status in the court. In the previous passages, she addresses him as
“men amy”, and speaks of the requirements of the “vray amoureux” in third person.
Only when he accepts this role does her tone become authoritative. Saintré is thus
obliged to listen by Madame des Belles Cousines’s social power, but obliged to obey by
the power she holds in their relationship.

After three years of faithful service, Madame des Belles Cousines’s tone has
changed. Although she still makes frequent use of the imperative, the impersonal and
distant “maistre” and “sire” have become “mon tres loyal desir”, “mon seul amy et ma
tres doulce pense’e”. Accompanying this change of tone is a change in status. Saintré
becomes the king’s varlet trenchant, and earns the respect of the squire he served under
as page.

Four or ﬁve years later, when Madame des Belles Cousines prepares to send
Saintré out on his ﬁrst emprise, the imperative has vanished. She uses similar terms of
endearment, but requests rather than demands: “je me suis appensee que vous estes

desormais assez homme pour faire en armes nommees quelque bien...je veul que pour

25

l’amour de moy vous portez un bracelet d’or esmaillié a noz devises... ” (79). Note also
that the devises have become “ nos” rather than “ mes”. At this point Madame des
Belles Cousines recognizes that she has completed the ﬁrst phase of Saintré’s formation.
She tells him, “vous estes tel que je veul” (85).

When Saintré returns from Prussia, he has earned enough power and respect to
inﬂuence the behavior of the king. He convinces the king to spend the night with the
queen, thus freeing himself to spend the night with Madame des Belles Cousines. The
shift in their relationship is underlined by Saintré’s role as the one who manipulates
others to assure that their meeting will be undetected and prolonged. Saintré thus
demonstrates that he has learned her lessons well, but his taking the initiative in their
relationship foreshadows the break that follows. Saintré is no longer a frightened
adolescent trying to avoid the displeasure of his mistress, but a strong, self-conﬁdent
young man who sees himself as Madame des Belles Cousines’ partner.

Saintré’s success has thus eroded Madame des Belles Cousines’ power of
legitimate position. Saintré still loves and respects her, and is deeply grateful for all she
has done for him, but this describes a softer basis of power, that of legitimate reciprocity.
Coupled with Madame des Belles Cousines’ diminished legitimate position power is
Saintré’s increasing power of legitimate equity. He has served her faithfully for more
than fourteen years, doing all that she has asked of him and never revealing their love.
Thus the power balance between them is reaching equilibrium.

Madame des Belles Cousines’s decreasing reward power and expert power
contribute to the equalizing trend. Saintré is no longer dependent on Madame des Belles

Cousines’s ﬁnancial backing. His father’s death would have granted him not only the

26

title, but also the family resources. In addition to his family wealth, he likely brought
back spoils of war from his crusade in Prussia (Taylor 258). Aside from his own
personal resources, he can count on the king’s backing. In fact, when he leaves for
Prussia, the king is the only benefactor mentioned. No mention is made of any
contributions Madame des Belles Cousines may have made. This ﬁnancial
independence is another key ingredient in the emprise Saintré undertakes independently.
He designs the clothing and emblems they will wear, buys the horses, and makes all the
necessary preparations himself. He also tells his companions that he will secure the
king’s ﬁnancial backing, making no mention of ﬁnancial support from his lady (231).
All he expects of her is her leave.

Madame des Belles Cousines can no longer reward Saintré with greater prestige
or fame, because he has reached the top. The only reward she can still offer is that of her
affections. While Saintré still wants her love, this is a decidedly softer basis of power.
Saintré has become ﬁrst a knight, and second a lover, as evidenced by his refusal to
abandon his project at her orders, even when she withdraws the reward in question,
telling him She will never love him again. His honor and duty toward his companions
outweighs his will to obey his lady and seek her favor. This is especially evident when
one considers that when he goes to her, his companions are the only ones who know of
the adventure. He would lose face with them, but the court and the general public are
still unaware of his plans.

Madame des Belles Cousines’s expert power has decreased only because she has
imparted her expertise to Saintré. He has learned all the lessons, from how to dress and

how to conduct himself at a tournament to the ﬁner workings of the court and how to

27

manipulate them to his own advantage. Coupled with the information and advice he has
received from Madame des Belles Cousines, Saintré now possesses a great deal of
experience. He has traveled to Spain, to the border with English territory, and to Prussia.
He has defeated visiting knights from Poland and Italy. He has also worked his way
through the ranks of the court, learning its intricacies at every level, guided by Madame
des Belles Cousines, but making his own observations along the way as well. Thus the
student has equaled, if not surpassed, his teacher.

The only powers Madame des Belles Cousines still holds are legitimate equity
and referent power. As we have already seen, Madame des Belles Cousines’s referent
power over Saintré is one of the principal motivations for his undertaking of the ﬁnal
emprise. Saintré is no longer limited to blind obedience. Rather, having become
independent of the stronger forms of power Madame des Belles Cousines exercised over
him, he is free to devise his own means of attempting to please her. Saintré’s plan
should, in principle, please Madame des Belles Cousines, but she is so taken aback by the
independence it indicates that one can easily imagine her scarcely hearing a word he says.

Thus it becomes clear that Madame des Belles Cousines has been only too
successful in her transformation of a young page into a knight, just as Pygmalion was
when he created his ivory maiden. Both of them pushed their art too far, Pygmalion
making Galatea too beautiful, and Madame des Belles Cousines creating a knight who
is too knightly. Saintré is strong and valiant, noble both in blood and in character, and
has earned the respect of the entire court. But Madame des Belles Cousines suffers from
the unexpected consequences of her transformational project. As a knight, Saintré bears

a dual allegiance, both to his lord and to his lady. For most of her educational project,

28

Madame des Belles Cousines has given Saintré assignments that allow him to advance in
his pursuit of both war and love as his knightly conquests increase his standing in the
court and in her eyes. And so there is no conﬂict between Saintré’s pursuit of Venus and
his pursuit of Diana. But when Madame des Belles Cousines declares Saintré’s hunt for
glory and prowess complete, Saintré’s coincidental desires are forced into a competition
where love is ultimately the loser.

Madame des Belles Cousines has created a warrior who is most likely bored by
court life. Fifteen months after his return from Prussia, he needs something to occupy
himself. Indeed, the queen’s prediction when Saintré asked her permission for his ﬁrst
emprise has come true. She observes, “se Dieu 1e ramaint en bon point, il me semble
qu’il ne vouldra faire autre chose, puis que si josne s’i va bouter” (87). Saintré realizes
that if he is to embark on any more adventures, they will have to be of his own design,
since Madame des Belles Cousines has already told him She will not send him out again.
His desire to continue his conquests sets him apart from knights like Chrétien’s Yvain,
whose devotion to his lady sapped him not only of his desire to continue his career as a
knight, but also, for a time, of his reason. Saintré does not fall into this trap. By
designing his own emprise, Saintré sees a means both of demonstrating the skills he has
acquired during his time in Madame des Belles Cousines’s service as a tribute to her love
and guidance and a way to ﬁnd some excitement.

Madame des Belles Cousines’s violently negative reaction to Saintré’s
announcement of his emprise is surprising. Saintré’s undertaking demonstrates how
successful she has been. He has become everything She wanted him to be. She has,

however, failed to impress upon him the importance of asking leave, both of one’s lady

29

and of one’s lord. Saintré’s error in this area is clear not just in Madame des Belles
Cousines’s reaction, but in the king’s as well. He is concerned that Saintré is seeking
glory, tempting both Fortune and God, who have been so good to him in the past, and
who might change their treatment of him. The king raises these rational objections to
Saintré, in addition to underlining his error of not asking leave. He tells Saintré and his
companions, “Mes amis, vous faites comme cellui qui espouse sa cousine, puis en
demande dispensacion. C’est a tous chose mal faite de entreprendre, et pis de executer,
sans licence de son seigneur ou de cellui qui a son pouoir et sa charge” (237).

But the king forgives Saintré for his error. Despite Saintré’s pleading,
Madamedes Belles Cousines refuses to do the same. Like Pygmalion, she has fallen in
love with her creation. While her obsession does not appear to be as all-consuming as
Pygmalion’s, everything she does revolves around his development and advancement.
Her involvement quickly moves beyond fascination with an interesting diversion and the
requisite love in exchange for faithful service. Madame des Belles Cousines’s love for
Saintré slips from her control as well. At his ﬁrst tournament, she faints, and cannot
watch for fear of betraying her feelings for him. When she hears that he will soon return
from Spain, she cannot Sleep because she is so eager to see him. And when She sees
Loisellench’s enormous size only after sending Saintré to meet his challenge, she berates
herself, “He'! lasse moy doulante, et que as tu fait, ne que pensoies tu quant tu conseillas
et mis en voye de telz perilz cellui que en ce monde plus amoys et que sur tous et toutes
l’en devoie desmouvoir?” (149), followed by fervent prayers for his protection.

In many ways, Madame des Belles Cousines serves as a maternal ﬁgure for

Saintré, a role highlighted by Saintré’s initial reponses to her questions about the lady he

30

loves most, and then by his ﬁbs to others to protect Madame des Belles Cousines’s
identity. When asked who gave him the money to purchase his clothes, shoes, and
horses, he replied that his mother had sent him the money. Madame des Belles
Cousines’s desire to see Saintré succeed and her intense concern for his safety conform to
this maternal role. But, as in the Pygmalion myth, the dangers of incest and narcissism
arise. Pygmalion himself escapes punishment for his incestuous relationship, but his
descendants pay the price. In a healthy mother-child relationship, Madame des Belles
Cousines should be proud of Saintré’s independence. She would interpret his
undertaking as he intended, rather than as a betrayal. As suggested by Taylor, Saintré’s
undertaking of his own emprise and his break with Madame des Belles Cousines
constitute the ﬁnal step in his becoming a knight (260). He has to cut the apron strings to
fully achieve the status of the greatest knight of France. But because Madame des Belles
Cousines is involved in an erotic relationship with him that is based on a balance of
power heavily weighted in her favor, she cannot let him move outside her sphere of
inﬂuence and still continue the relationship of subordination. 5 As long as Saintré carries
out her wishes, heeds her advice, and obeys her every command, he reﬂects back to
Madame des Belles Cousines her own chivalric ideal. When he exerts his independence,
the image is distorted, and there is no way for Madame des Belles Cousines to regain
control and restore her image.

When Pygmalion lost control of Galatea, her metamorphosis into a living woman
brought her back under his control. The full weight of societal convention granted
Pygmalion, as her husband, a position of power over her, rescuing him from the status of

a loved—crazed artist ridiculously obsessed with one of his statues. For Madame des

31

Belles Cousines, there is no possible return to her former power. Her concern for her
own independence is suggested in the narrator’s opening description. She is a young
widow with many suitors, but has decided never to remarry. The narrator refuses to
explain why, but offers examples of virtuous Roman widows who never remarried for
love of their husbands.

Lest we associate Madame des Belles Cousines with these loyal, chaste women,
the narrator quickly undermines his hypothesis that viture is the reason behind her refusal
to remarry. The narrator cites Dido as an example of one of these exemplary widows. In
his version of Virgil’s story, Aeneas is so deeply in love with Dido that he is dying from
his passion, but Dido cannot accept his love because she remains committed to the
memory of her husband. Interestingly, the outcome of Virgil’s own version bears a
striking similarity to the ending of the relationship between Saintré and Madame des
Belles Cousines. Having been rescued after a shipwreck by Dido, spending time in her
court, and falling in love with his benefactress, Aeneas is faced with a choice between
love and adventure, in this case the fulﬁllment of his destiny as the founder of Rome.
Aeneas opts for duty, leaving his lover so wounded and empty that she commits suicide.
Saintré confronts a Similar choice, though on a less epic scale, choosing his self-
appointed destiny over his continued attachment to his own benefactress, and Madame
des Belles Cousines reacts in a similar fashion, committing social suicide as a parallel to
Dido’s taking her life.

By distorting a story that shares many elements with the one he is about to tell,
the narrator suggests to his readers that there is more to Madame deS Belles Cousines’

refusal to remarry than a virtuous devotion to her dead husband, just as there is more to

32

the relationship between Dido and Aeneas. The narrator follows this story with three
anecdotes taken from the writings of Saint Jerome. Two of the stories are what we would
expect, describing young widows who refused to marry and vowed to continue mourning
or live alone until death. But the third tells the story of a woman who married and
outlived twenty-two husbands. Her twenty-third husband has had twenty wives, and all
of Rome waits to see which one of them will survive. When the wife dies, the husband is
widely celebrated, recognized as a victorious hero for outliving the woman who outlived
twenty-two men.

This final story perhaps hints at Madame des Belles Cousines’s motivation for
remaining unmarried. She has outlived one husband and regained her indepedence, and
may be unwilling remarry for fear that she may not outlive the next one. Widowhood
was the most independent state available to a woman in the late Middle Ages and early
Renaissance. Her father’s property until she married and her husband’s afterwards, a
woman could only exercise some control over her own life as a widow (Cholakian 192).
Rather than restoring control as it did for Pygmalion, marriage would only further upset
the balance, increasing Saintré’s power and weakening her own. Madame des Belles
Cousines’s status as a woman makes a satisfactory resolution impossible: there is no
socially acceptable way for her to maintain a relationship with Saintré that would allow
even an equal distribution of power between them.

Madame des Belles Cousines’s recognition of the untenability of such a
relationship may explain her choice of The Abbot. Unable to retain her independence
within the system of the court, Madame des Belles Cousines attempts to opt out. By

retreating to the countryside, to her own lands, she escapes the rules and power structure

33

of society, at least temporarily. She ﬁnds a new companion in the Abbot. As Mermier
notes, there is no question of ever marrying him (479). As the benefactor of his abbey,
she also exerts legitimate position power and reward power over him. It is in the Abbot’s
best interests to please her, and he does so, not by leaving her behind as he sets off in
search of glory and adventure, but by keeping her at the abbey, preparing lavish meals,
and accompanying her on hunting outings. Away from the restrictions of court life,
Madame des Belles Cousines does not feel obligated to construct secret systems of
communication in order to steal a few forbidden moments, but conducts her affair freely
and openly. Her relationship with the Abbot is, in short, the reverse of her relationship
with Saintré. Instead of coaxing along a shy, slender boy, Madame des Belles Cousines
is actively pursued by a robust and very forward man. This sounds like the very situation
she was initially trying to avoid, but this time Madame des Belles Cousines has chosen a
man who cannot threaten her independence.

What she gambles and loses is her reputation, but her behavior leading up to
Saintré’s revelation of their relationship and her subsequent conduct leads one to question
her continued concern for it. She fraternizes openly with the Abbot, much to the
consternation of her entourage and the other monks at the abbey. She puts off her return
to court with little concern about what the queen might think, and makes no effort to hide
her relationship with the abbot even from the queen’s messenger. When Saintré returns,
her conduct is no different. The narrator attributes this change to her lust for the abbot,
ending her part of the story with a warning to all women not to follow the example of
“ceste si tres noble dame oiseuse qui par druerie se perdist” (307). This overt

condemnation of Madame des Belles Cousines’s behavior departs radically from the

34

I7.

manner in which the narrator has treated her up to this point. Beginning with the initial
discussion of her motivations for remaining unmarried, the narrator has refrained from
judging her behavior. Even when Madame deS Belles Cousines mocks and humiliates
Saintré when he returns from his last emprise, the only editorial comment the narrator
permits himself is a reference to Jehan as the “pouvre seigneur de Saintré” (283). That he
would choose to condemn her now seems out of character, but he links her behavior to a
proverb that echoes Madame des Belles Cousines’s own teaching, “Oncques ne fut feu
sans fumee, tant fust il en terre parfont” (3 07). Thus, it appears that the reason lust is to
be avoided is not that it is intrinsically evil, but that it is impossible to conceal from the
rest of society.

Madame des Belles Cousines’s apparent lack of concern for her reputation, a lack
which could admittedly be the result of her lust, but which seems unlikely given the
dissimulative skill she has demonstrated in her relationship with Saintré, suggests another
interpretation of her behavior. Her treatment of Saintré is indefensible, but it
demonstrates the extent of her disenchantment with courtly life and its constant
dissimulation and artiﬁce. Little is said about her reaction to Saintré’s revelation of her
conduct, other than that she was “bien honteuse” (307), but if her reputation means as
little to her as her conduct suggests, one wonders how long her shame lasted and whether
her life ended miserably because of it. Madame des Belles Cousines has learned through
the outcome of her relationship with Saintré that there is no place in courtly society for a
woman who wishes to maintain both her independence and an intimate relationship. She
cannot restore the power balance between herself and Saintré, and is unwilling to submit

to the authority society would grant him.

35

The failure of their relationship leads to the destruction of Madame des Belles
Cousines’s remaining bases of power. Because of her refusal to acknowledge Saintré’s
claims of legitimate equity, he no longer feels subject to her power of legitimate
reciprocity. And in destroying their relationship, Madame des Belles Cousines destroys
her referent power. In the ﬁnal scene, the power shift is complete. After Saintré tells
their story before the court, concealing the characters’ true identities, he asks Madame
des Belles Cousines to comment on the lady’s behavior. She defers, unwilling to speak,
just as Saintré was when asked about his lady sixteen years earlier. This time, Saintré, as
the holder of her secret, wields the power, and it is he who laughs at her expense.
Stripped of her honor and social standing, she has become powerless.

The construct of courtly love, or ﬁn ’ amours, purports to place the woman in a
position of power, but the outcome of Madame des Belles Cousines’s relationship with
Saintré emphasizes that the young man derives the greatest beneﬁt. Saintré has become
exactly what Madame des Belles Cousines set out to make of him, “un homme renommé”
while she is cast out of a society that has no place for her. Even if their relationship had
not taken the dramatic, disastrous turn it did, there never seems to have been any prospect
of lasting happiness and fulﬁllment. Madame des Belles Cousines’s power slowly erodes
as Saintré’s grows, leaving her a choice between submission and solitude. Even her
attempt to opt out is denied. Madame des Belles Cousines’s creation has escaped her

control, leaving her with nothing and underlining the obstacles to female power in the

courtly society of the late Middle Ages.

36

l'

Chapter 2

Transformation through self-sacriﬁce: Heptaméron 26 and the Lys dans la valle’e

The twenty-sixth novella of Marguerite de Navarre’s Heptaméron and Honoré de
Balzac’s Lys dans la Valle'e tell stories of women who die of broken hearts like many
heroines of literature. One need only think of Echo and Narcissus or Tristan and Iseut.
What sets Marguerite’s and Balzac’s heroines apart from so many others is their attempt,
before succumbing to the power of unfulﬁlled desire, to create a new kind of lover who
will fulﬁll their need for love without compromising their virtue. To accomplish this
goal, their Pygmalion projects will be more tightly focused than the transformation
attempted by Madame des Belles Cousines in Antoine de la Sale’s Petit Jehan de Saintré.
They will attend more to matters of character than to fame and social success. Their
exercise of the bases of social power, ﬁrst elaborated by French and Raven, will vary
accordingly.

Marguerite wrote her story sometime between 1546 and 1549. The sixteenth
century had brought with it the rise of humanism and, key to understanding Marguerite’s
works, an increase in religious tensions. Marguerite’s sympathy toward the reformers is
clear in her association with the group at Meaux, and her protection of Reformers and
Protestant writers such as Lefevre d’Etaples, Cle'ment Marot, and John Calvin. It is also
evident in her own writing. She repeatedly demonstrates a greater concern with personal
spirituality than with the rites and public performance of the Catholic church.1
Marguerite also writes from a position of privilege. As Francis I’s sister and consort, as

well as queen of Navarre, she beneﬁted from a classical education and exercised an

37

inﬂuence not commonly accorded to women of her day. Pierre Jourda details her
education and position in French society, noting the careful attention Marguerite’s mother
paid to the education her children received and to the position of privilege Marguerite
occupied next to her brother. Yet even she is not free, caught in the bind of patriarchy.
Heptaméron 26 reveals a woman’s vision of the consequences of female desire in the
context of her society.

To better understand the lady of Pampelune’s Pygmalion project it is helpful to
situate the 26th nouvelle in the context of the Heptaméron itself. Like Boccacio’s
Decameron and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, the Heptaméron is a framed narrative. Ten
members of the nobility, ﬁve men and ﬁve women, ﬁnd themselves trapped at a
monastery while waiting for ﬂood waters to recede, a situation similar to the one in which
Marguerite found herself in September of 1546 (Déjean 310). To pass the time, they
agree to take turns telling stories. Although the topics of the stories vary, the majority
discuss the nature of love. No clear conclusions emerge. In his essay, “Modular
Narrative and the Crisis of Interpretation”, Michel Jeanneret concludes, “This is how the
Heptameron is: The storytellers can reason and moralize about love, about psychology,
about the genders, and outline numerous appropriate and useful thoughts. But the picture
is never ﬁnished. One never stops ﬁnding variations, exceptions, and the need for
revised conclusions” (101).

Along with the exploration of a philosophy of love, the closely-tied question of
honor, especially the differing conceptions of male and female honor, is one of the most
frequently debated topics in the text. Men achieve honor through conquest. However,

the Heptaméron tells very few tales of men winning honor by military exploit.2 Rather,

38

like the admiral Bonnivet, men gain the admiration of their peers through the successful
seduction of virtuous women.3

Male honor thus linked to sexual conquest brings it into direct conﬂict with the
conception of female honor, which is based on chastity and marital ﬁdelity. This
construction of a woman’s honor ensures the legitimacy of the father’s offspring and the
longevity of the family name, ultimately serving male interests. The best woman from
this perspective, therefore, is one without desire (Cholakian 13). Yet the male
storytellers complain constantly of women who will not give in to their natural desires,
remaining “cold” and “cruel”. Hircan’s contribution to the discussion following the 26th
novella represents their argument:

“Aussi, que leurs robbes sont si longues et si bien tissues de dissimulation, que 1'
on ne peult congnoistre ce qui est dessoubz, car, si leur honneur n' en estoit non plus
taché que le nostre, vous trouveriez que Nature n' a rien oblye’ en elles non plus que en
nous; et, pour la contraincte que elles se font de n' oser prendre le plaisir qu' elles
desirent, ont change' ce vice en ung plus grand qu' elles tiennent plus honneste. c' est une
gloire et cruaulté, par qui elles esperent acquerir nom d' immortalité, et ainsy se
glorifﬁans de resister au vice de la loy de Nature ( Si Nature est vicieuse ), se font non
seullement semblables aux bestes inhumaines et cruelles, mais aux diables, desquelz elles
prenent l' orgueil et la malice” (914).

Such a statement is not, however, an offer to women to share in the sexual
freedom men enjoy. Men invite them to follow nature and accede to their desires not for
their own pleasure or good, but for men’s enjoyment and satisfaction (Cholakian 131). In

so doing, as Gary Ferguson points out, they are speaking to women as mistresses rather

39

than wives (145). The woman who accepts will ruin her reputation, while the woman
who refuses will be labeled a hypocrite. The code of feminine virtue frustrates male
desire, and renders the satisfaction of female desire within the patriarchal system nearly
impossible.

Colette Winn suggests that Marguerite de Navarre seeks a resolution to this
conundrum by promoting a rehabilitation of marriage in which the chaste, but not virgin,
female body can ﬁnd fulﬁllment of desire without staining honor (106). While marriage
offers a logically appealing solution to the double bind of female honor, it is not a
solution supported by the historical context or the text itself. Marriage in Marguerite’s
day served to satisfy the desire for political gain, conﬂict resolution, or ﬁnancial security
rather than the need for human companionship, mutual love and respect, and the
satisfaction of physical desires. Marguerite’s own marriage to the Duke of Alencon was
arranged to end a long-standing legal dispute (Jourda l9). Jean-Luc Déjean concludes
that, in Marguerite’s eyes, marriage remained “un mal nécessaire” (322).

In the Heptaméron, love, even in its purest and most virtuous forms, is frequently
seen as an obstacle to the perfect love of God. In novella 70, Mme du Verger, a widow
who has engaged in what Oisille describes as a chaste relationship, offers this dying
lament after the promise to keep her love secret has been broken. “Helas! Ma pauvre
ame, qui, par trop avoir adoré la creature, avez oblié 1e Createur, il fault retourner entre
les mains de Celluy duquel l' amour vaine vous avoit ravie” (1103).4 Of all the
Heptaméron tales that deal with love, stories ending in the death of one or both lovers far

outnumber stories in which the two lovers live happily ever after.5

So what happens when women desire? There are several tales of women who
ignore the demands of virtue and, as Hircan urges, follow the law of Nature. Most of
these tales are told to amuse, and tend to involve bourgeois or working-class women who
ﬁnd clever ways to trick their husbands and hide their affairs with monks or young
neighbors. Noble women who act on their desires without regard for their virtue tend to
draw sharp criticism.6 The stories that most seriously investigate the problem of female
honor and desire center on women who attempt to satisfy the demands of both.

Rolandine, of story 21, has reached the age of thirty without being allowed to
marry. Her stingy father and the bitter queen to whom She is related have turned away all
suitors. Unable to operate within the acceptable power structure, Rolandine acts
independently, forming an alliance with a bastard of noble birth who ﬁnds himself in a
similar situation. He cannot marry because of his dubious pedigree and his lack of good
looks to compensate. These qualities certainly exclude him from marrying anyone of
royal blood. The queen’s efforts to keep them apart force the pair to great lengths to
remain in contact, feigning illness, pretending to go on pilgrimages, and sending
messages through elaborate networks. They ﬁnally marry secretly, though they agree not
to consummate the marriage until Rolandine’s father has consented. Thus Rolandine
seeks to resolve her dilemma while remaining within the bounds of chastity. Ultimately,
the plan fails. The marriage is discovered, Rolandine is locked in a tower, the bastard
ﬂees, only to marry a rich German woman, and her marriage is annulled. Nonetheless,
all ends well for Rolandine, who is ﬁnally married off properly. Her miserly father and
greedy brother both die, leaving her the family inheritance and a chance to live happily in

a marriage approved by both parental and royal authority.

41

Story 43, one of the best-known stories of the Heptaméron, tells the tale of
Jambique, a woman with an imposing reputation for virtue who creates a space where she
can satisfy her desire. Keeping her identity secret, she sends a message to the object of
her gaze, asking him to meet her in a dark gallery. She arrives, wearing a mask over her
eyes and her hood pulled down over her face. In a low whisper, she confesses her love
and promises her faithfulness as long he agrees not to seek her identity. The gentleman
agrees, and the affair continues. As La Guardia observes, “what Marguerite de Navarre
offers us here is a feminist desire that is outside of language, that refuses to present the
feminine body as the symbolic object of a narcissistic masculine desire, and that
concentrates its satisfaction within the tactile realm” (143,4). Jambique’s alternative
space cannot last, however. Her lover cannot imagine a woman who “ne voulﬁt étre vue
et aime’e”, and so, overcome by curiosity, he marks her shoulder with chalk. Having
identiﬁed his mistress, he confronts her, thinking that their love can only grow.
Jambique, however, true to her word, denies everything and uses her inﬂuence with the
mistress of the household to have the young man sent away.

Rolandine and Jambique, in an attempt to satisfy their desires, disregard social
conventions, whether of parental and royal authority, or of morality. They seek
happiness outside the patriarchal system of marriage, and both ultimately fail. Rolandine
ﬁnds happiness only when she re-enters the system, marrying a man her father approves
of. In Jambique’s case, the gentleman is sent away, preserving Jambique’s reputation,
but destroying the space she had created to express and fulﬁll her desire.

Throughout the Heptaméron, a woman’s power is more effectively asserted in a

social context by substituting linguistic for sexual intercourse. When the members of the

42

company stranded at Notre-Dame de Sarrance discuss ways to stave off the boredom that
is becoming unbearable, Hircan’s ﬁrst choice of activities is rejected by his wife, who
responds, “laissons la les passetemps ou deux seullement peuvent avoir part et parlons de
celluy qui doibt estre commun a tous” (709). Parlamente follows this reprimand with the
suggestion that they pass the time telling stories. This substitution of text for desire noted
by Robert Cottrell recurs in novella 26 as well as throughout the text (14). This linguistic
sublimation moves desire into a realm largely controlled by women. As LaGuardia notes
in his analyses of novellas 10, 21, and 43, access to the networks of communication in the
Heptaméron is controlled by female authority ﬁgures (139). In the sphere of language, as
determined from the outset of the game, all players are equal, regardless of relative social
status or gender. This rule set by the storytellers plays out in the tales as well. Thus, by
drawing her young protégé into a relationship characterized by discourse, the protagonist
of novella 26 has the best chance of controlling it. The bases of power accessible to her
are bases that function primarily in the sphere of language, those of expert power,
conveyed by lessons, and referent power, the importance of the relationship between
them.

Saffredent, a defender, like Hircan, of the “follow your natural drives” point of
view, narrates Heptaméron 26, the story of two women, “une folle et une sage”. The
latter, a young lady from Pampelune, seeks the same goal as Jambique and Rolandine: the
satisfaction of her desire without the sacriﬁce of her honor. Unlike Jambique and
Rolandine, however, she makes her attempt entirely within the patriarchal system of
acceptable relationships between men and women. She does not mask her desire through

darkness and disguise, nor does she ﬂout parental or royal authority. Rather, She takes on

43

the role of Pygmalion, intending to shape a new kind of lover who will devote himself to
her on her terms.

The scope of the transformation the lady of Pampelune wishes to effect is much
more limited than that undertaken by Madame des Belles Cousines in Ie Petit Jehan de
Saintré. Rather than attempting to sculpt an entire social being to her speciﬁcations, the
lady seeks instead to cultivate virtue and weed out desire, a task perhaps no less difﬁcult
though less broad. The bases of power she has at her disposal and chooses to draw upon
are much more limited than those of Saintré’s benefactress, a situation partly accounted
for by their relative social status. D’Avannes is the king’s brother, while la sage is a
member either of the upper bourgeoisie or the lower aristocracy (Cazauran 43).

At the beginning of the story, the seigneur d’Avannes, like Saintré, is very young,
but already “tant beau et tant plain de toute bonne grace, qu' il sembloit n' estre faict que
pour estre aymé et regardé; ce qu' il estoit de tous ceulx qui le voyoient, et, plus que de
nul autre, d' une dame demorant en la ville de Pampelune en Navarre” (902). Unlike
Madamedes Belles Cousines who formulated her project and then chose the raw material,
the lady of Pampelune is inspired to undertake her transforming work by the qualities
d’Avannes possesses at the outset. This highlights an important difference between
Madamedes Belles Cousines and “la sage”. Madameseeks a distraction and so steps
boldly and purposefully beyond the boundaries of social acceptability. Marguerite keeps
the lady of Pampelune within the bounds of virtue by making the initiation of the
relationship her husband’s responsibility. She is charmed by d’AvanneS, but it is unlikely

that she would have ever pursued him had her husband’s actions not placed them in

frequent proximity. She takes advantage of an opportunity, seeking to shape their
relationship into something safe and fulﬁlling at the same time.

The lady of Pampelune is twenty-three years old, and married to a wealthy man
who is nearly ﬁfty. The age difference between them, however, does not occasion
inﬁdelity or frivolity on her part. She lives honestly, dresses modestly, and consequently
has her husband’s complete faith. At a relative’s wedding, the lady’s husband asks
d’Avannes to dance with his wife, which he does willingly, not because the lady is
beautiful, but because he loves dancing. His partner, meanwhile, “regardoit plus la grace
et beaulté du dict seigneur d' Avannes, que la dance 06 elle estoit, combien que, par sa
grande prudence, elle n' en ﬁt ung seul semblant” (903). By describing d’Avannes as the
passive, unwitting object of the lady’s gaze, the narrator underlines the reversed direction
of desire in this novella, a reversal that becomes problematic because female desire must
operate within the patriarchal structure (Freccero 132).

After the wedding, the lady’s husband accompanies d’Avannes home. Out of
gratitude for the honor d’Avannes has shown to him and his family, and because he has
no children of his own, he offers d’Avannes a regular source of spending money,
knowing that the higher nobility can be stingy. D’Avannes happily accepts, laying the
foundation for a relationship with the gentleman and his wife.

D’Avannes visits his benefactors regularly, eating and drinking with his “pére par
alliance”, and spending time with his wife, who not only sees to his requests when her
husband is away, but also takes the opportunity to advise d’Avannes to be wise and
virtuous. Her kindness, generosity, and wisdom inspire both his love and fearful respect:

“...il la craingnoit et aymoit plus que toutes les femmes de ce monde” (904). Reward and

45

expert power are the operative bases of power used to inﬂuence d’Avannes’s behavior at
this stage of the story. The promise of ﬁnancial support from the husband creates the
opportunity for a relationship to develop between d’Avannes and the lady, though this is
not the direct reward power Madamedes Belles Cousines wields. Continued support is
not contingent on d’Avannes’s following a set of instructions to his benefactors’
speciﬁcations. Rather, rewards become part of a relationship of mutual gratitude. One
could speculate that the couple’s generosity motivates d’Avannes to listen politely to the
lady’s advice on virtue, but the text gives no indication that he does so because he feels
obligated, but rather because of the soundness of the teaching.

The lady’s lessons gain credibility because she lives what she teaches, shoring up
her expert power. She is a model of virtue, enjoying both an impeccable social reputation,
as seen in the narrator’s initial description of her, and the admiration, respect and trust of
her husband. Her husband’s trust in her is so complete that he puts the administration of
the household under her control. His conﬁdence in her contrasts sharply with the
situation of the other woman in the story, the “folle”, kept under constant watch by both
her husband and her parents.

The lady’s reward and expert power build her most powerful means of inﬂuence,
her referent power. D’Avannes places a high value on maintaining and strengthening
their relationship. When he turns seventeen and starts noticing women, the narrator
explains, “Et, combien qu' il eust plus voluntiers ayme’ la saige dame que nulle, si est-ce
que la paour qu' il avoit de perdre son amityé, si elle entendoit telz propos, le feit taire et
se amuser ailleurs” (904). The lady’s referent power repeatedly prompts d’Avannes to

modify his behavior as he progresses toward her goal.

At this early stage in his moral formation, d’Avannes uses virtue precisely as La
Guardia has noted, as a mask for desire (114). Ironically, he doesn’t wear a mask of
virtue for the lady he is seducing, but for the lady he truly loves and does not wish to
disappoint. The object of his pursuit, a substitute for the true object of his desire, is
recognized even by her parents as “belle et legiere”. From the exchanges they have had
at the parties and balls d’Avannes has held to please this young woman, encounters kept
brief because of the watchful eyes of her parents and husband, d’Avannes has recognized
that he only needs opportunity to ensure a successful conquest. But to create this
opportunity, he will be absent from the home of the virtuous lady and her husband. He
masks his desire with a virtuous explanation, a pilgrimage to Montserrat.7 When the lady
sees through his story and warns him to look after his health, his blush tells the truth of
the situation, but he continues with his plan. D’Avannes thus demonstrates that, although
he has listened to her lessons, he has not begun to internalize the values his lady is
teaching.

D’Avannes’s plan unfolds exactly as they both expect. Disguising himself as a
stable boy, another mask, this time for his conquest’s husband, d’Avannes sells two
horses to the folle’s husband, and succeeds in getting hired as the head of the stables.
Having gained access to the household, he needs only to make his presence known and
the lady takes care of the rest. Before long, however, his double life of groom by day and
lover by night takes its toll on his health, just as the wise woman had warned him. Too
sick to be of any use to his mistress, d’Avannes is sent home until he has regained his

strength.

47

D’Avannes returns to the house of his father “par alliance” and his wife. The
narrator tells us that her love for him has not diminished, but that she sees immediately
that she was right about his “pilgrimage”. She admonishes him, and d’Avannes, both
angry and embarrassed, responds.

This is the ﬁrst time in the text that d’Avannes speaks in direct discourse, marking
a turning point in both d’Avannes’s and the plot’s development. In the context of their
relationship, d’Avannes has been passive. He was admired by the lady of Pampelune for
his grace and beauty, asked by her husband to dance with her, offered ﬁnancial aid,
advised and encouraged to be virtuous, and now admonished because he was not. His
response in his own voice marks a shift from this largely passive role to a new, more
active one. He replies, “Madame, j' ay aultresfois ouy dire que la repentence suyt le
peché; et, maintenant je 1' esprouve a mes despens, vous priant excuser ma jeunesse, qui
ne se peut chastier que par experimenter du mal qu' elle ne veult croire” (907). From this
point on, d’Avannes will no longer be an empty receptacle to be ﬁlled with wise words,
but will actively explore the implications of choosing virtue, testing its limits and
ultimately achieving his lady’s goal for him, total devotion to her in a perfectly chaste
relationship.

This point parallels Saintré’s undertaking of his emprise, and both mirror the
moment of Galatea’s animation.8 As noted earlier, marriage offered a means for
Pygmalion to retain control of his creation after She came to life, but no such solution
presents itself for his female counterparts. Madame des Belles Cousines rejects Saintré
when she ﬁnds her bases of power have eroded, but the lady of Pampelune sees

d’Avannes’s repentance as a step closer to the completion of her Pygmalion project,

48

which is now explicitly presented for the ﬁrst time . .elle esperoit tousjours que, apres
avoir passé ses premiers jours en follies, il se retireroit et contraindroit d' aymer
honnestement, et, par ce moien, seroit en tout a elle” (908). This passage reﬂects the
Ned-Platonic thread that runs through the Heptaméron, a philosophy of love often
advocated by Parlamente. Jules Gelemt summarizes, “love manifests itself first as desire
for earthly objects, and only gradually can man reach the understanding that his desire is
nothing other than his soul’s yearning to return to its heavenly home” (144). The lady of
Pampelune has her sights set on a middle rung of this ladder. Despite her hopes, this
new, active d’Avannes proves much more dangerous to her virtue and her very existence
than was the boy who loved and feared her.

The lady proﬁts from d’Avannes’ two-week convalescence to exercise her expert
power again. She speaks to him so wisely on loving virtue that “il commencea avoir
horreur de la follye qu' il avoit faicte” (908). But his sin is not the only thing d’Avannes
recognizes. He also realizes that the wise lady surpasses the foolish one both in beauty
and in grace. Thus, she secures her place as the object of his desire, an integral step in
bringing her project to completion. However, she has not yet succeeded in convincing
d’Avannes of the merits of “aimer honnétement”, demonstrated by the seduction attempt
that follows.

D’Avannes waits for a dark day, “chassant toute craincte dehors” to make his
move, cloaking his seduction attempt in the language of virtue.9 He sets the bait, telling
la sage that he has decided to devote his heart entirely to the love of virtue, and asking
10

her if she is willing to help in any way she can. The lady, “fort joyeuse”, agrees.

D’Avannes then attempts to spring the trap. Citing Christ’s incarnation as a means to

49

bring mankind to the love of God, d’Avannes requests that his lady serve as an
incarnation of Virtue, “parquoy , je vous recongnois et confesse non seullement
vertueuse, mais la seulle vertu; et, moy, qui la voys reluire soubz le vele du plus parfaict
corps qui oncques fut, la veulx servir et honnorer toute ma vie, laissant pour elle toute
autre amour vaine et vicieuse” (908).

Gary Ferguson identiﬁes d’Avannes’s rhetorical strategy as a reversal of
Neoplatonic ideology. Rather than seek a shift from the physical to the abstract spiritual,
d’Avannes requests a physical representation of Virtue in the person of the “sage” (147).
While d’Avannes’ choice of rhetorical strategy could be, and has been, interpreted as a
skillful attempt at manipulation, expertly tailored to his target, Nicole Cazauran sees
d’Avannes’s modiﬁed attempt as progress. ” Whether his strategy displays progress
toward his lady’s goal or not, her referent power prompts this masking of his real desires.
Although she sees through his attempt, she is pleased, and hopes to bring about a
convergence of the language he uses to please her and the true desires of his heart. To
encourage him in this direction, she exercises a combination of reward and referent
power. She tells him that, despite her inability to incarnate Virtue for him, she does feel
for him an affection as great as her fear of God and concern for her honor will allow. But
she places conditions on the declaration of her love: “Mais ceste affection ne sera
declarée jusques ad ce que vostre cueur soit susceptible de la patience que 1' amour
vertueux commande” (909). Displaying a complete lack of understanding of what he has
just heard, d’Avannes begs for a kiss as a guarantee of her word, a sensuous rather than
chaste response (Regosin 83). When she refuses, he once again employs his manipulative

skills to get what he wants. He begs the lady’s husband to consider him his son, and asks

50

to kiss him as a Sign of his affection. He then asks permission to kiss his wife,
d’Avannes’s new “mother”. The gentleman agrees, and kisses are exchanged, with no
sign from the lady whether she wants to kiss him or not. '2

The kiss further fans the ﬂames of d’Avannes’s desire. When he discovers that
his brother, the king, is moving his court, he decides to make one ﬁnal effort to succeed.
The ﬁgurative ﬂames become literal as d’Avannes sets ﬁre to his own house in order to
manipulate his way into his lady’s bed. He deludes himself into thinking that, like the
folle, the lady really only needs opportunity to change her mind about their relationship.
Her husband, hearing that d’Avannes’ house is burning, rushes to the site, wraps
d’Avannes in his own robe, and brings him home to his wife, who is still in bed. He
issues her singular instructions: “traictez-le comme moy-mesmes” (910). D’Avannes, as
the narrator notes, would like nothing better, and hops into bed. To his chagrin, his lady
hops just as quickly out the other side, threatening him with an end to their relationship.
“Croiez que ainsy que 1’ or s' esprouve en la fournaise, aussy ung cueur chaste au millieu
des tentations s' y trouve plus fort et vertueux, et se refroidit, tant plus il est assailly de
son contraire... si vous voulez que je continue 1' affection que je vous porte, ostez non
seullement la volunté, mais la pensée de jamais, pour chose que seussiez faire, me treuver
aultre que je suis” (910). In response to d’Avannes’s overt assault on her honor, the lady
of Pampelune exercises one of the most potent bases of power, coercive power. Here,
coercive power takes the form of a personal sanction, a threat to end their relationship. ‘3
As a result of the threat, d’Avannes spends the night unable to eat or Sleep, so great is his
fear that he has damaged their relationship. But the next morning he sees in her eyes

more pity than anger, which only augments his passion.

51

Separation of the female Pygmalion ﬁgure and her creation is a constant.14
Saintré left Madamedes Belles Cousines in order to carry out his emprise, and d’Avannes
leaves for Taffares with his brother’s royal court. Both women have similar initial
reactions, becoming gravely ill. Saintré’s lady, however, regains her health by replacing
the object of her desire with a new, less threatening one. But the lady of Pampelune
remains stolidly within the bounds of a woman’s honor. We learn that she has been able
to check her desire through regular contact, seeing and talking to d’Avannes. Deprived
of this outlet, “la guerre que l’amour et l’honneur faisaient en son cueur” becomes
unbearable. As she weakens and nears death, her husband sends a letter to d’Avannes
begging him to come in the hopes that his visit will do his wife good. D’Avannes returns
immediately, arriving just in time for the lady to complete her transforming work. Near
as she is to death, she can at last reveal the passion she has felt for d’Avannes without
risk to her honor. D’Avannes is left speechless, stunned perhaps by her commitment to
God, her husband, and her honor. But he is the one for whom she is dying. “Car
entendez, Monseigneur, que Dieu et mon honneur ne m' ont jamais permis de vous
declarer [ma grande affection], craingnant d'adjouster en vous ce que je desiroys de
diminuer” (912). Death serves as both a witness to and a release from love (Regosin 86).
In her dying declaration, she thus adds to her referent and expert powers the power of
legitimate equity, the necessary tool to complete her work. The revelation that her
commitment to honor and virtue and her desire to foster their growth in d’Avannes is so
great that she will sacriﬁce her life to preserve and encourage them achieves d’Avannes’
transformation. He is, after this experience, “en tout a elle”. He leaves Pampelune and

returns to his brother’s court, where “il demeura beaucoup d' années, sans vouloir ne

52

veoir ne parler a femme du monde, pour le regret qu' il avoit de sa dame; et porta plus de
dix ans le noir” (913).

Thus the lady of Pampelune, like Madame des Belles Cousines, is ultimately
successful in her Pygamalion project. She has cultivated virtue and weeded out desire in
the young man she loves. But she has achieved her goal only by sacriﬁcing her own life.
And so we arrive at another dead end in the search for a resolution to the struggle
between desire and honor. Madame des Belles Cousines chooses desire and pays with
the sacriﬁce of her reputation, her social status, indeed her public existence. The lady of
Pampelune chooses honor, dissimulating her desire. In her “death before dishonor”
approach, she follows the example of Lucretia and other martyrs for virtue, some of
which can be found in the Heptaméron itself.” But no one can argue that this is a
positive outcome. While her joyous death is, according to Robert Cottrell, a sure Sign of
salvation in the Heptameron, the situation in which the patriarchal code of honor places
women who desire renders life impossible (19).

The discussion at the end of novella 26 between the male and female storytellers
focuses on a woman’s honor. Tetel notes the role of the conversations between
storytellers in promoting ambiguity (149). Saffredent, the tale’s narrator, does not
disappoint. He opens the discussion by undermining the distinction he made between his
two female characters. One breath after recounting the glorious death of his supremely
virtuous heroine, he suggests that perhaps it is she who deserves the label “folle”. From a
lover’s point of view, as expressed by Hircan, women’s commitment to chastity is only a
mask for pride. Not acting on the desire they feel is merely hypocrisy. The women argue

that self-control merits some recognition and that if they do fall prey to the sin of pride, at

53

least their sin does not injure any third parties, as does the killing of others in war or the
dishonoring of women in love.

Both sides, however, fail to comment on what the lady of Pampelune was
attempting. She did not simply deny her desire. Instead, she tried to reshape its
expression and mold its object into a lover that could share a new kind of relationship
with her. Discourse substitutes for intercourse, affection for feu. She opens the
possibility of confessing her love, but only when he is ready. Doing so too early will
doom her project, encouraging his advances and putting her honor at greater risk.
Dissimulation is thus portrayed less as a sign of hypocrisy than as a necessity for success.
Regular contact provides a release valve that keeps the ﬁre from burning out of control
and suggests that, had d’Avannes not left for Taffares with his brother, she could have
continued their relationship. This is not a perfect solution, as Cazauran justly notes.
Even if the relationship were successful, it remains merely a passable substitution for
what both parties really want. Seeing and talking to d’Avannes only enables “la sage” to
keep her desire in check. It does not sublimate or erase the physical desire she feels (241,
2). But it does represent an attempt at resolving an untenable situation.

The question remains whether d’Avannes’s conversion to “parfaict amour” could
have been completed without the death of his lady. After his third seduction attempt,
d’Avannes spends a sleepless night fearing that he has lost the “privaute’” he enjoyed.
When he sees in her eyes the next morning that she feels more pity than anger, “[ce] fut
ung charbon adjousté davantaige a son amour” (911). The lady’s exercise of referent and
coercive power are able to produce only short term modiﬁcations of his behavior. Only

the power of legitimate equity, the desire to atone for harm or pain one has caused, can

54

complete the task the lady of Pampelune set for herself. D’Avannes’ transformation
requires the sacriﬁce of her life, leaving her dream of a lover she can enjoy without threat
to her honor ﬁrmly beyond her grasp.

Viewing the lady of Pampelune as a female Pygmalion ﬁgure underscores the
impossibility of resolving the conﬂict between human desire and social convention for
women in the sixteenth century. Her role as sculptor of her ideal should give her a much
greater chance of success than her counterparts who play the role of desired object. If
ever a woman had a chance to be happy in love, it was she. She chose her lover early,
before the notion of desire entered his mind. She cultivated a relationship of respect,
love, and even holy fear. She did everything within her power to ensure success, and had
she succeeded, she would have established a space in which she could love while
remaining within the bounds of virtue. But in creatively circumventing social norms, she
is confronted with an even more basic reality, that of human nature. In this sense, the
Pygmalion theme is particularly apt. D’Avannes is very much like a statue from ancient
Greece, beautifully sculpted, but missing limbs because the artist conceived it in bronze,
but executed it in marble. Despite her careful efforts and dedication to her work, the lady
of Pampelune cannot overcome the inherent limitations of her medium. As long as she
possesses a body, d’AvanneS will desire it.

In telling this tale, along with several others, Marguerite sketches the impossible
situation in which women who desire ﬁnd themselves. She gives examples of women
who attempt various means to resolve their dilemmas, but none is satisfactory. Jeanneret
continues his description of modular narrative, “The modular collection never uses up all

the material and never settles the questions” (101). Marguerite’s tales are not

55

prescriptive. How can they be when told by ten storytellers with ten different
perspectives on love and human relationships? The discussions that follow often serve to
further embroil the issues under consideration. Which of the two women was really the
wiser? Can natural drives really be equated with vice? Was dying from unrequited
passion the best way to handle the situation? While Marguerite does not answer these
questions deﬁnitively, nor resolve the larger issue of the impossible tension between
desire and virtue, she does bring the issue to the forefront. She is deeply embedded in her
aristocratic, patriarchal milieu, having been used as political currency herself not once,
but twice, and having watched her daughter undergo the same experience.16 While she
cannot use her position to change women’s status, she can give voice to their problems
and create a space where they can discussed and debated.

The story of a virtuous woman attempting to create a lover who will not threaten
her honor reappears in Honoré de Balzac’s Lys dans la valle'e. Herbert Hunt notes that
the theme of tension between spiritual and ﬂeshly love so carefully explored in the
Heptaméron occurs frequently in nineteenth-century literature. Sand, Sainte-Beuve, and
Balzac investigate the ties between love and spirituality (107). In Le Lys dans la valle’e,
Balzac retells Marguerite’s tale from Galatea’s point of view.17

In the nearly three hundred years since Marguerite told her tale, women’s status in
society did not improve. In her introduction to French Feminism in the 19'” Century,
Claire Goldberg Moses summarizes the historical changes that occurred after the Middle
Ages, when women beneﬁted from a somewhat ambiguous status (2). The codiﬁcation

of laws in the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries increasingly excluded women from power,

while the increasing complexity of society rendered their traditional exclusion from

56

 

universities a greater disadvantage (3). Women gained some power and social standing,
as well as access to an informal education, in the milieu of the 17th and 18‘h century salon.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, however, attacked this involvement of women in public life.‘8
James McMillan notes that the idea of separate spheres for men and women was nothing
new, but the 19th century saw a much wider propagation of the doctrine (Housewife 9). It
was a position adopted by both clericals and non-clericals, the Right and the Left. Men
were to be citizens, women wives and mothers. From their place in the home, women
were to be the dominant moral inﬂuence, not only in the lives of their children, but, by
extension, on society as a whole (France and Women 51). The traditional double
standard of morality is only strengthened by the assignation of women to the sphere of
the home. A woman’s chastity and ﬁdelity are integral to the preservation of the purity
of the family, while a man’s sexual activity has little consequence for the sanctity of his
own hearth (Housewife 16). The woman in Romantic literature reﬂects this ideal. She is
cast in the role of angel, saint, or Madonna, an ingenue in need of protection. She is
childlike, self-sacriﬁcing, and subordinate to men’s needs and interests (George 18). In
1804, the Napoleonic Code furthered this role by barring women from citizenship.
George summarizes the essence of the code’s deﬁnition of men’s and women’s roles.
Husbands owe protection to their wives, wives obedience to their husbands (20). Balzac
does little to challenge the predominant attitudes toward women. Brinda J. Mehta
describes the ideal women of Balzac’s ﬁctional universe. “La vraie femme était celle qui
ne possédait pas vraiment de sexualité; ainsi, elle ne pouvait pas menacer la fragilite’ de la

psyche masculine, trop avide de maintenir sa maitrise (sur la femme, bien sﬁr)” (5). The

57

question raised by Marguerite about the consequences of a woman’s desire thus remains
unresolved three centuries later.

The similarities between Marguerite’s and Balzac’s stories are pronounced. Both
have a central pair of a virtuous woman and the younger man she loves. The women are
married to men who place the responsibilities of running their households in their wives’
hands. The young men displace their desire for the virtuous women who remain above
their grasp onto an overtly sexual, blatantly unchaste substitute. Both repent and return,
only to be separated by courtly duties calling them away. For the women, the separation
is deadly. Both become ill, their fevers a physical manifestation of the passion they have

repressed. They confess their passion only from the safety of imminent death, and both ".

 

deaths achieve their goals. In addition to the similarities in plot, the two texts are framed
narratives forming parts of larger texts, the Heptaméron and the Come’die Humaine, and
include the narratee’s reaction and interpretation of the text. However, our interest in the
comparison of these two texts lies in their differences, differences that certainly arise
from a shift in historical context and the differences that exist between authors, but which
may also be attributed to a change from a female author to a male.

Each of the similarities noted above disguises important differences. Both
women are married to older men, who place household management responsibilities in
their wives’ hands. ”However, these responsibilities are a mark of complete trust and
conﬁdence on the part of the sage’s husband, while Henriette de Mortsauf has to take
them on because her husband is incapacitated. Both women profess to love their
husbands, but the lady of Pampelune’s husband is a good, honest man who loves and

honors his wife, while Monsieur de Mortsauf is jealous, prone to ﬁts of anger, and

58

verbally abusive. The wives’ motivations to remain virtuous reﬂect these character
differences in their husbands. The motivation for the sage comes from her love of God
and her husband. She wishes to remain faithful to both, and thus refuses to compromise
her virtue with d’Avannes. Henriette uses her virtue as a shield from her husband’s
jealous rages and irrational accusations. She tells Félix, “Eh, mon ami, songez done en
quel enfer je tomberais si je donnais a cet étre sans pitié, comme le sont tous les gens
faibles, le droit de me mépriser ? Je ne supporterais pas un soupcon. La purete’ de ma
conduite fait ma force.” (169).

Henriette and the sage ﬁrst encounter their prote’ge's at celebrations—a ball for the
Duke of Angouléme (a nod to Marguerite?) and a family wedding. In Marguerite’s text,
the sage’s role as desiring subject is underlined, but Félix initiates contact with Madame
de Mortsauf. She happens to sit near him at the ball, where Félix, so taken with her
beauty, modesty, and purity, throws himself into her back, kissing her white Shoulders.
Henriette thus begins her role in the story as a desired object. Félix’s ﬁrst encounter with
passion leaves him seemingly ill, so his family sends him to Touraine. There, Félix
senses her presence, then glimpses her in a white dress standing on the terrace of her
home in the bottom of the valley. His interest in her home provokes his host to note,
“Vous sentez de loin une jolie femme comme un chien ﬂaire le gibier” (46). The
objectifying metaphors continue: Felix talks of stalking the prey of pleasure, refers to her
as a “pomme délicieuse”, and is curious to meet Monsieur de Mortsauf, “le possesseur de
ce tre'sor”.

Félix retains his role of subject even as Madame de Mortsauf undertakes her

project, a two-fold transformation, resembling more closely that of Madamedes Belles

59

Cousines in scope. She undertakes a broader project because she needs more from F élix
than the sage needs from d’Avannes. Both women are awakened to passion by the
presence of these young men, and both attempt to channel their passion into acceptable
forms. But Madame de Mortsauf gains much more from F élix’s presence, casting him
into all the unﬁlled roles in her life. When Félix comes dangerously close to professing
love for her, She lays out the ground rules for their relationship, describing what he must
become for her. “Je croyais a de pures amitiés, a des fraternités volontaires... Je voulais
un ami qui ne fﬁt pas un juge, un ami pour m’écouter en ces moments de faiblesse ou la
voix qui gronde est une voix meurtriére, un ami saint avec qui je n’eusse rien a
craindre...j’ai cru que j’aurais une time qui serait a moi seule comme un prétre est a tous,
un coeur ou je pourrais épancher mes douleurs quand elles surabondent, crier quand mes
cris sont irrésistibles, et m’étoufferaient si je continuais ales dévorer ” (109).

Neither Madamedes Belles Cousines nor the lady of Pampelune elaborates so
clearly her project to the young man she intends to transform. Henriette’s revelation
effects a shift in the nature of the project that more closely balances the power between
them. Now aware of Madame de Mortsaufs plans for him, Félix replies, “J ’accepte ce
contrat qui doit se résoudre en souffrances pour moi. Je me donne a vous sans arriere-
pensée, et serai ce que vous voudrez que je sois” (110). Though still the target of referent
and coercive power, F élix’s explicit acceptance of Henriette’s expectations elevates him
to the status of partner in the relationship, giving him a level of agency his counterparts
lack.

The ﬁrst two roles Henriette gives F élix to ﬁll are those of her confessor and her

aunt. Like a confessor, she wants Félix to be “moins qu’un amant, mais plus qu’un frére”

60

(135). She also seeks to restore the affection she lost when her aunt died. When Félix
asks her how she wants him to love her, she replies, “Aimez-moi comme m’aimait ma
tante.” (118). She permits Fe’lix to call her Henriette, the name by which only her aunt
had called her. When Félix returns to Clochegourde after an absence, she gives him her
aunt’s former bedroom to underline the chaste, affectionate nature of their relationship.
In another attempt to denature her feelings, she casts Felix in the role of her oldest
child (145). F élix provides hope for the future of her own children, both as an example
of survival and as a source of support for them in the future. The second part of
Henriette’s project springs from this role in which she has cast Félix, one that is more

superﬁcial, yet more successful. Here, she takes a sickly, timid, unloved adolescent who

 

still looks like a little boy and transforms him into a conﬁdent, capable man who can
successfully navigate the pitfalls of Parisian society. This neglected youngest son wins
the favor of Louis XVIII, earning his conﬁdence as well as a secret position working
directly for him. Madame de Mortsauf helps him establish connections with the most
important women in Paris, older women who can help him advance in society. With their
backing, as well as the king’s favor, Félix rises to the top of the Parisian social and
political scene.

Given six months’ leave, he returns to Clochegourde unannounced, eager, like
Saintré, to show his lady how much he has accomplished as the result of her teaching.
Fe’lix describes himself on his return: “ Pour la premiere fois, j’allais me montrer a celle
que j’aimais, non seulement un peu moins niais, mais encore dans l’appareil d’un jeune
homme e'légant dont les maniéres avaient e'té formées par les salons les plus polls, dont

l’éducation avait e'té achevée par les femmes les plus gracieuses, qui avait enﬁn recueilli

61

le prix de ses souffrances, et qui avait mis en usage l’expérience du plus bel ange que le
ciel ait commis a la garde d’un enfant” (212). The changes wrought in him result from
Henriette’s exercise of her expert power in the form of the letters she writes, and of her
referent power, which is clearly visible in Félix’s desire to please her.

As is the case with Madamedes Belles Cousines and the lady of Pampelune, the
success of Madame de Mortsauf 3 project increases the threat the creation poses to its
creator. Michael Lastinger discusses the blending of gender traits in many of Balzac’s
characters in Le Lys dans la vallée, and Félix is not exempt. When he arrives at
Clochegourde, he does not know if he is male or female, adult or child (240). Henriette

maintains his confusion and her control by asking him to play multiple roles: her aunt,

 

her confessor, her friend, her child, her protector. When Félix goes to Paris, he begins to
resolve this identity crisis and returns more sure of who he is. “Quand Henriette vit le
jeune homme la ou elle n’avait jamais vu qu’un enfant, elle abaissa son regard... je la
trouvai pale” (213). F élix’s strength and independence threaten Henriette’s hold on him
and on herself. Her fears provoke her to remind Félix of their contract:

“. . .m’aimez-vous saintement?

-- Saintement.

—- A jamais?

-- A jamais.

-- Comme une vierge Marie, qui doit rester dans ses voiles et sous sa couronne blanche?
-- Comme une vierge Marie visible.

-- Comme une soeur?

-- Comme une soeur trop aimée.

62

-- Comme une mere?

-- Comme une mere secretement désirée.

-- Chevaleresquement, sans espoir?

-- Chevaleresquement, mais avec espoir.

-- Enﬁn, comme Si vous n’aviez encore que vingt ans, et que vous portiez votre me’chant
habit bleu du bal?

-- Oh I mieux. Je vous aime ainsi, et je vous aime encore comme...

Elle me regarda dans une vive apprehension...

-- Comme vous airnait votre tante.” (214)

She ﬁnishes the exchange with a word of advice: “Je résisterai toujours a la force de
l’homme; mais que refuserais-je a l’enfant? Rien : il ne peut rien vouloir que je ne puisse
accorder” (215). Viewing F élix as a child rather than a man enables Henriette to continue
to channel her feelings for him away from a woman’s passion toward a mother’s
affection. Far more than Marguerite’s, Balzac’s text emphasizes the mask of maternal
love. D’Avannes uses this disguise for his feelings only as a ruse to get the kiss he so
desperately desires from his lady. She never attempts to cast her feelings into a maternal
mold. In the Lys, Henriette is the one who adopts this model, not only to hide the nature
of her feelings from her husband, but also from F élix and even herself. This attempted
self-deception differentiates her from the lady of Pampelune, whose dissimulation
implies recognition of her desire in spite of her unwillingness to make it known. F e’lix, as
is clear from the passage cited above, rejects a maternal interpretation of the nature of
their relationship. Each of Henriette’s attempts to purge their relationship of desire are

met with his own insistence on its existence. Her invocation of the Virgin is met with an

63

emphasis on Mary’s physicality, recalling d’Avannes’s request that his lady incarnate
Virtue for him so that he can better pursue it. Félix’s agreements to love her as a sister, a
mother, and a noble lady all cross the line of her expectations of chastity. While Félix
may agree not to act on his desire, he will not deny that he feels it.

Henriette’s insistence on the chastity of their relationship pushes F élix, like it did
d’Avannes, to “s’amuser ailleurs”. D’Avannes sought out his folle, organizing parties
and balls to gain access to her, and eventually disguising himself as a stable boy to
provide an opportunity for success. Balzac shifts the blame for F élix’s inﬁdelity to Lady
Dudley, who pursues and eventually seduces him. He explains himself, writing to
Natalie, “Un home a moins de ressources pour résister a une femme. Nous vous
laissons 1e monopole de la modestie pour que vous ayez le privilege [d’accorder] des
faveurs ; mais invertissez les roles, l’homme succombe sous la moquerie.”(255, 6).

Here is Balzac’s version of the folle and the sage, Arabelle and Henriette, amour
charnel and amour divin (60), la maitresse du corps and l’e'pouse de I’dme (61). Pierre
Barbéris identiﬁes this pair of the siren and the angel as a recurring feature of Balzacien
myth (143). The importance of the Romantic ideal could not be more evident. Madame
de Mortsauf is everything a woman should be. Balzac wrote to Eve Hanska, “Je
prepare. .. une grande et belle oeuvre, une ﬁgure de femme charmante, pleine de coeur,
ayant un mari maussade, et vertueuse. Ce sera, sous la forme purement humaine, la
perfection terrestre comme Séraphita est la perfection ce'leste” (Hanska 11 mars 1835).
Her sphere is home and family. She is devoted to her husband and her children,
channeling all her efforts into activities that will nurture, sustain, and provide for them.

She sacriﬁces her own dreams and desires for their beneﬁt.

 

 

 

 

Arabelle is the antithesis of this ideal. She spends most of her time in the public
sphere, moving in the same social circles F e'lix does. Félix’s description of her home as
cold and impersonal demonstrates Arabelle’s dissociation from it. Henriette decries Lady
Dudley’s violation of her maternal responsibilities as she sacriﬁces her reputation and
thus the purity of her family name to pursue Félix. Arabelle’s desire certainly excludes
her from the category of the virtuous and, in Henriette’s eyes, from the category of
woman. This depiction of a desiring woman supports Mehta’s observation that, in
Balzac’s novels, “. . .chaque femme devient coupable lorsqu’elle possede une
sexualite’.”(5). Arabelle’s ﬁnal sin is her survival. The perfect woman dies when she
thinks her love has been betrayed. The siren uses a man and then rejects him (Barbéris
144). When F élix sees Arabelle after their break, she barely acknowledges his presence.
“Qth a notre intimite', a cette passion éternelle, a ces serments de mourir si je cessais de
l’aimer, tout avait disparu comme un réve” (364). His role as her lover has been
returned to de Marsay, one of her husband’s natural sons, another corruption of the
private sphere to which a woman should limit herself.

For spiritual love to triumph over ﬂeshly love, the male Galatea ﬁgure must leave
his “maitresse du corps” and devote himself to his “e’pouse de l’ame”. This proves much
more complicated for Félix than for D’Avannes. The latter is forced to leave the folle’s
household because the insatiability of her sexual appetite has weakened him to the point
of illness. Once he returns to the sage, he never goes back. Félix maintains a double
existence. He is in Paris with Arabelle, but continues to write to Henriette as if nothing
has changed. When he goes back to see her, he allows Arabelle to accompany him,

leading to a meeting of the beast and the angel that never occurs in Marguerite’s text.

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While this certainly creates a dramatic moment in the text, it also serves a healthy portion
of male ego-stroking, to which F e’lix himself confesses. “[J]e surpris dans mon ame un
mouvement d’orgueil de me savoir l’arbitre de deux destinées si belles; d’étre la gloire, a
des titres si différents, de deux femmes si supe’rieures, et d’avoir inspire’ de si grandes
passions, que de chaque cote' la mort arriverait si je leur manquais”(309). Félix does not
break with Arabelle until Henriette’s death is imminent. D’Avannes’ renunciation of his
behavior is brought on by the teachings of the sage, while Fe’lix’s only comes about as a
guilty reaction to the pain he has caused the woman to whom he is truly devoted. Thus,
the lady of Pampelune is able to change d’Avannes’S behavior with her expert power,
while Henriette can use only the powers of legitimate equity and legitimate dependence.

Overall, Félix’s relationship with Arabelle plays a more important role in the text
than does d’Avannes’ with the folle. The sage regards d’Avannes’s pilgrimage as a
necessary youthful indiscretion from which he can advance to total devotion to her.
Félix’s relationship with Arabelle occurs later, after he has professed a pure and holy love
for Henriette, and beneﬁted enormously from her advice and connections. Henriette,
then, is deeply wounded by Félix’s relationship with another woman, which can truly be
seen as a betrayal. Her illness and death are much more attributable to his inﬁdelity than
to his absence.

Whether dying as a result of separation or of betrayal and jealousy, both the lady
of Pampelune and Henriette at last confess their desire. Their confessions differ in ways
that extend beyond the precise cause of their deaths. Marguerite’s heroine offers no
regrets. She made the decision to conceal her love both to protect her own honor and to

complete d’Avannes’. Revealing her love would only have undone what she had started.

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Her conﬁdence in her decision enables her to reveal her desire face to face. Henriette, on
the other hand, makes her confession in a letter that is to remain sealed until after her
death. She is tormented with doubts about the wisdom of her choice. At one point, in her
feverish delirium, she says she cannot die because she has not lived. She resolves to be
like Lady Dudley and run off to Italy with Félix. Heinz Weinmann details Henriette’s
taking on of Arabelle’s qualities. The ﬁre associated with Arabelle dries up the water
Félix has associated with Madame de Mortsauf (140). Even in her confessional letter,
presumably written in a period of lucidity, she admits to dying of jealousy as well as
pent-up passion.19 Henriette, then, intemalizes the debate of Marguerite’s storytellers,
remaining unresolved as to which path, hers or Arabelle’s, was the wiser. She ﬁnishes
her posthumous letter, “moi, j’arrive au lieu du repos, immolée au devoir, et, ce qui me
fait frémir, non sans regret I” (358).

In both stories, the power of legitimate equity is the ﬁnal tool needed to complete
the transformation. Both young men are changed as they are confronted with the
sacriﬁces the women they loved have made, and ﬁnd themselves obligated to become
what their creators wanted them to be. Both avoid women for a long time, devoting
themselves to the memory of the one who died to make them what they are. We know of
d’Avannes only that he wore black for ten years, but we see that Félix remains
emotionally crippled by his experiences. As he tells Natalie at the beginning of his letter,
he is haunted by a ghost, a ghost that Natalie decides not to compete with. She ﬁnds his
dream of Arabelle and Henriette united in a single woman unrealistic, and refuses to

attempt to embody this expectation.

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The cumulative effect of these differences between Balzac’s and Marguerite’s text
is to shift the balance of power between Pygmalion and Galatea. Both women exercise
reward power, though the lady of Pampelune, along with her husband, offers ﬁnancial
rewards for a continuation of d’Avannes’s association with her family, while Henriette’s
rewards consist of tender or grateful glances, or the offer of her hand for Félix to kiss, the
value of which she may be unaware. Expert power determines much of the shape the
young man is to assmne. The sage focuses exclusively on cultivating virtue, while
Madame de Mortsauf adds advice on political and social success. The power of
legitimate reciprocity comes into play as well. The lady of Pampelune cares for
d’Avannes when he returns weak and sick from his adventure with the folle, and Madame
de Mortsauf provides invaluable advice to Fe’lix, which earns him remarkable success in
Parisian society. Both young men are indebted.

For both women, however, the bulk of their inﬂuence derives from their referent
power and its corollary, coercive power in the form of threats to end the relationship.
D’Avannes and Félix value these relationships above all else, and are willing to modify
their behavior to preserve them. However, the power of legitimate equity is required to
effect the necessary changes of the heart. Félix and d’Avannes are able to move beyond
their desire only when they see the suffering and sacriﬁce that their loves have endured
for them. They are, of course, aided by the lifelessness of the body they desire. Both
young men leave their physical desires behind in a last, formerly impermissible gesture.
D’Avannes throws himself onto the sage, kissing and embracing her until he is forcibly

removed from her body. Félix kisses Henriette’s forehead “avec tout l’amour qu’elle ne

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m’avait jamais permis d’exprimer” (346). Fe’lix’s kiss on Henriette’s forehead does
however symbolically preserve the chaste intellectuality of their relationship.

The power that only Madame de Mortsauf exercises is that of legitimate
dependence. Henriette needs him. Implicit in Henriette’s reliance on him is an
acknowledgement that F élix, too, exercises power in this relationship, the power of
legitimate reciprocity. He replaces her aunt as a source of affection and love in a life
otherwise devoid of it, and serves as a buffer between Henriette and Monsieur de
Mortsauf, helping her deal with her husband’s illnesses and tantrums. He offers the
promise of a mentor for her son Jacques when he reaches maturity and perhaps a husband

for her daughter Madeleine. None of the other Galatea ﬁgures examined thus far,

 

including Ovid’s, have such a power at his or her disposal. The hold each of the others
has on the life of his or her creator is the result of the creator’s own efforts. Galatea’s
beauty is Pygmalion’s handiwork. While this is true in many ways of Félix as well, his
necessity to Henriette extends beyond the qualities she has created in him.
Corresponding to F élix’s increased power is a decrease in Madame de Mortsauf’ 3.
She begins and ends as an object, the star Félix chose as his companion during his
difﬁcult and lonely childhood. After his passionate kiss at the ball, he reﬂects, “Tombée
des steppes bleues ou je l’admirais, ma chére étoile S’était donc fait femme en conservant
sa clarté, ses scintillements et sa fraicheur”(40). At her death, she reclaims her astral
form. The abbé de Dominis prepares Félix for seeing Henriette on her death bed. “Vous
l’avez laissée ﬂeur encore. . .mais vous la retrouverez consumée, purifée dans le feu des
douleurs, et pure comme un diamant encore enfui dans les cendres. Oui, ce brillant

esprit, étoile angélique, sortira splendide de ses nuages pour aller dans le royaume de

69

lumiere” (325,6). Jean Gaudon identiﬁes this passage as cyclical. He explains, “. ..
l’incarnation de l’étoile en femme e’tait une chute. . .il importait de l’y faire remonter, pour
que Mme de Mortsauf ne soit plus, selon sa propre expression, ‘qu’une lueur élevée,
scintillante et froide, mais inalte’rable”’(73).

The female Pygmalion ﬁgure suffers when depicted by her Galatea. Her status in
Marguerite’s text was already problematic, but Félix undermines her power and
independence by elevating himself. More unsettling is the erosion of her virtue, the

quality that deﬁnes both her and the lady of Pampelune. Peter Brooks explains that the
nature of virtue itself has changed in Le Lys dans la vallée. It is no longer tied to the
sacred, but has become a sentiment rather than a moral imperative (152). Thus, Madame
de Mortsauf needs the additional anchor of her children, with her concern for their
reputation and her need to attend to their illnesses, to safeguard her from inﬁdelity,
though they cannot help her overcome her regrets, which mark the most dramatic
departure from Marguerite’s text.20 Marie-Jeanne Durry points out the troubling effect
the expression of Madame de Mortsaufs regrets. Félix attributes them to her illness,
telling himself “Ce n’est plus elle”. But he cannot deny the reality of the regrets she
expresses in her letter. Her victory over desire is experienced as a disaster, leaving her to
say “Tout a été mensonge dans ma vie” (222, 3).

A stronger Galatea coupled with a weaker, less virtuous Pygmalion would seem
to add up to a rather derogatory underlying view of women and their ability to exercise
power. If Le Lys dans la vallée consisted only of Félix’s letter to Natalie, one could
support this claim. Madame de Mortsauf remains admirable, but Balzac’s “perfection

terrestre” is less perfect than Marguerite’s, although perhaps more human. Her position

70

as wife and mother bar her from earthly happiness with Felix and her regrets cut her off
from perfect assurance of her salvation. She writes to Félix, “Le Seigneur me verra tout
aussi tremblante que Si j’avais succombé [aux Seductions qui m’ont environnée]” (358).
In contrast, the lady of Pampelune tells d’Avannes, “Je ne vous prierai point de prier
Dieu pour moi, car je sais que la porte de paradis n’est point refusée aux vrais amants, et
qu’amour est un feu qui punit si bien les amoureux en cette vie qu’ils sont exempts de
l’éipre tourment de purgatoire” (269).

But, true to his sixteenth-century model, Balzac undermines the story his principal
narrator tells, ﬁrst in Henriette’s letter to F e’lix and then in Natalie’s response, leaving us
with an ambiguous picture of the status of women in Balzac’s ﬁctional universe. What
Madame de Mortsaufs and Natalie’s letters make clear is that Fe’lix has been playing at
Pygmalion as well. He has sculpted his representation of Henriette into his own image of
perfection, attributing her transgressive expressions of desire and regret to her illness.
Henriette’s letter, presumably written while she was still lucid, undermines his attempt to
discount the reality of her passion and breaks down the barrier F élix has constructed
between her nature and Arabelle’s. She writes, “J ’étais aussi une de ces ﬁlles de la race
déchue que les hommes aiment tant” (355) . Natalie further deconstructs Félix’s view of
women. She rejects not only his ange/ sire‘ne dichotomy, but his proposal of a third term,
a combination of both in one woman, as well. She sides with both Henriette and Arabelle
in pointing out to F e’lix his injustice in playing them against each other, and in attempting
to hold Natalie to both standards. “Vous ne connaissez donc les femmes? Elles sont ce
qu’elles sont, elles doivent avoir les défauts de leur qualités. Vous avez rencontré lady

Dudley trop tot pour pouvoir l’apprécier, et le mal que vous en dites me semble une

7l

vengeance de votre vanité blessée; vous avez compris madame de Mortsauf trop tard,
vous avez puni l’une de ne pas étre l’autre; que va-t-il m’arriver a moi qui ne suis ni l’une
ni l’autre?”(369,70). Her advice to F e’lix,'intended to complete the education Madame de
Mortsauf began, is to renounce love altogether or, if he cannot, to hide his past.

What Natalie and Henriette’s letters do that Marguerite’s storytellers do not is
indict the creation for his role in his creator’s destruction. With increased power comes
increased responsibility. Henriette is not the victim of circumstance like the lady of
Pamplona, but of Félix’s willful disobedience. His involvement with Lady Dudley was
not a youthful indiscretion, but inﬁdelity, excused by an appeal to the double standard
discussed by Marguerite’s storytellers three hundred years earlier. But when we view
Henriette as a Pygmalion ﬁgure, part of the blame redescends on her. Henriette’s project
to bring Félix social and political advancement succeeds, but her desire to create a lover
“en tout a elle” is left unfulﬁlled. Her failure to convince him of the merits of spiritual
love coupled with her own wavering faith in it leads to her destruction.

Marcel Tetel’s concluding remarks on the Heptameron could easily have been
written about Le Lys dans la vallée as well. “True to the Renaissance spirit, it refutes
absolutes in the face of a multitude of equally valid choices... The tragic essence distilled
from the novellas is the impossibility of determining the exact nature of vice, virtue;
truth, falsehood; guilt, innocence; spiritual and physiological desires” (207). Despite the
ambiguity of both texts, the danger of the Pygmalion project is clear. Exercising power
in an attempt to transform another leads paradoxically to a loss of self-control.
Pygmalion beneﬁted from divine intervention to restore the balance of power between

creator and creation, but female Pygmalion ﬁgures who challenge patriarchal power

72

structures in asserting a woman’s control over a man can only appeal to God the Father.
They are saved not by bringing to life their creations, but by their own deaths. Their

destruction restores patriarchal order.

73

 

Chapter 3
Pygmalion’s Fall and Redemption: Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions and George
Sand’s Francois le champi

The Pygmalion story mythologizes many aspects of human life, including the
relationship between an artist and his or her work and the tendency toward self-love and
idealization. It also functions as a displaced myth of parenting, a facet of the myth that
explains our discomfort at the sexual aspect of the Pygmalion-Galatea relationship.
Ovid’s Metamorphoses expose the incestuous overtones of the tale as do the texts
examined in previous chapters. However, the relationships between Madamedes Belles
Cousines and Jehan de Saintré, the lady of Pamplona and the seigneur d’Avannes, and
Henriette de Mortsauf and F élix de Vandenesse cannot truly be characterized as mother-
son relationships. In le Petit Jehan de Saintré the situation itself is the primary source of
the maternal ﬂavor of the relationship. Saintré is young and far from home and his
mother; Madamedes Belles Cousines has no children of her own. The seigneur
d’Avannes uses the parent-child relationship proposed by his lady’s husband as a tool to
secure the kiss he so passionately desires in Marguerite de Navarre’s 26th tale of the
Heptaméron. Mme de Mortsauf attempts the same transposition of desire in order to
mask the true nature of her feelings for F élix de Vandenesse, but maternity never
accurately characterizes their bond.

To examine this dynamic in its full expression, and its effects on the exercise of
power, we turn to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions and George Sand’s Francois le
champi. Rousseau’s mother died in childbirth and F rancois’s mother abandoned him at
an orphanage, leaving both of them searching for someone to ﬁll the void. They ﬁnd

their mother ﬁgures in the women who take them in.1 Mme de Warens and Madeleine

74

Blanchet quickly take responsibility for their young protége’s, providing them with food,
lodging, and love. Once these needs are met, both women focus on the future of their
adopted sons, setting them on the path to independence. In addition to these external
marks of a mother-son relationship, the internal dynamics of the relationship resemble a
parent-child relationship as well. Mme de Warens and Rousseau quickly fall into the
habit of calling each other “Maman” and “Petit”. Madeleine grows to love Francois
nearly as much as she does her son, Jeannie, and when Francois complains that she
doesn’t kiss and caress him as mothers do their children, Madeleine recognizes her
omission and, from then on, treats him like her own son (68).

There are, of course, fundamental differences between these two texts.
Rousseau’s is confessional, written with the goal of defending himself from his critics
and justifying himself to his readers. This agenda, despite protestations of candor, colors
his narration, both by his selection of events and the light in which he places them.
Sand’s text is ﬁctional, depicting life in rural nineteenth-century France. Rousseau’s text
is unique in this study as the only work of non-ﬁction; Sand’s is unique as the only one
that leads to a happy ending. Whether as a deliberate move on her part or not, Sand
echoes many aspects of the relationship between Mme de Warens and Rousseau in her
tale of Madeleine and Francois while ﬁltering out their ﬂaws. What emerges is the story
Rousseau might have liked to live.

We will begin with the story he did live, a story that revolves around women, as
noted by Sarah Herbold (“Dance” 342). From his ﬁrst loves, Mademoiselle de Vulson
and Mademoiselle Goton, to his passion for Sophie d’Houdetot and his comfortable

companionship with Therese Levasseur, his relationships and infatuations with women

75

mark every phase of his life. But one is pivotal. Mme de Warens towers above her more
than twenty rivals for the most important place in Rousseau’s memory, dividing both his
life and his text into two halves (Herbold “Genre” 85). Rousseau credits her with
enabling him to grow, mature, and recognize his own nature. Their relationship passes
through several phases, reﬂected in the bases of power available to Mme de Warens as
she works to inﬂuence her prote’gé.

To understand the nature of Mme de Warens’ project better, we must investigate
her character. Supplementing Rousseau’s own depiction with the historical research
conducted by his biographers, we can sketch a portrait of this woman to whom Rousseau
attributed such an enormous inﬂuence. Rousseau describes her at their ﬁrst meeting.
Expecting to ﬁnd an excessively pious old woman, he sees “un visage pétri de graces, de
beaux yeux bleus pleins de douceur, un teint e'blouissant, le contour d’une gorge
enchanteresse” (87). Her beauty combines with her intelligence and grace to render Mme
de Warens an exceptional woman in Rousseau’s eyes. Interrningled with her physical
description are snippets of her history. Rousseau tells us she was from an old noble
family in Vevey, had married young, but not happily, and as a result, had thrown herself
at the feet of King Victor Amadeus during a visit to Evian, thus abandoning her husband,
family, country, and religion.

Rousseau biographers Matthew Josephson and Maurice Cranston largely agree
with Rousseau’s description. They evoke an ambitious young woman with an active
mind, a generous heart, and an idiosyncratic sense of virtue. Her religious mentor,
Francois Magny, emphasized religious experience and piety over the form, ritual, and

dogma of organized religion. She also studied chemistry and physics, an unusual

76

education for a young woman of her time. She married into a wealthy and prestigious
family at the age of fourteen, and quickly developed a reputation as a wonderful
entertainer (Josephson 46). She also experimented in medicine and alchemy, activities
Rousseau witnessed and was often forced to participate in. Mme de Warens was a
businesswoman as well, “attempting single-handed to introduce the Industrial Revolution
to the canton of Vaud” (Cranston 71). She built factories to produce soap and stockings,
as well as other items, but was not successful at keeping them running. Her failed
entrepreneurship eventually brought about her husband’s ﬁnancial ruin.

Mme de Warens also sought to escape the boredom of her married life by taking
on various lovers. Her ﬁrst was the Colonel de Tavel, no doubt aided in his conquest by
the individual sense of virtue Francois Magny had taught her. As Rousseau tells us, M.
de Tavel convinced her that there was no sin in adultery, only in the scandal it could
bring about (235). Her practice of forming attachments with those who served her by
becoming sexually intimate with them demonstrates the inﬂuence of Tavel’s philosophy.

Josephson and Cranston ﬁll in the details of her departure from the Vaud as well.
She did not arrive in Evian empty-handed, but with many valuable household items as
well as signiﬁcant capital from her factories. Her conversion to Catholicism as well as
her personal charm assured her monthly pensions from the Bishop of Bemex and the
King of Sardinia. Because as a married woman she could not become a nun, she was set
up in Annecy with the unofﬁcial function of receiving converts leaving Switzerland and
sending them on to Turin to complete their conversion. Cranston and Josephson agree

that part of her pension was payment for her services as an agent of the Sardinian throne,

sent from time to time on secret, semi-diplomatic missions. Her sudden departure for

77

Paris while Rousseau was accompanying Le Maistre to Lyon was most likely
necessitated by one of these missions.

While Josephson and Cranston agree with Rousseau that Mme de Warens was an
exceptional woman, Jean Guéhenno debunks Rousseau’s portrait of her in the same way
that he critiques the rest of Rousseau’s autobiography. He presents a largely
unremarkable woman—less pretty than Rousseau would have us believe, a little vain,
something of a schemer, neither entirely good nor entirely bad, in short, ordinary. In
Guéhenno’s depiction, the only characteristic that stands out is her kindness and gentle
patience (23). Nonetheless, Guéhenno’s objective assessment cannot diminish the
importance Rousseau placed on the role Mme de Warens played in shaping his character
and direction in life. He shows her to us through his eyes. Of course, his perspective
changes, and one catches notes of the bitterness he must have felt at having been
replaced, but other moments are told through the eyes of the young man experiencing
them. This is certainly the case when he describes their ﬁrst meeting. The reality he
faced, compared with the pious old de’vote he had pictured, could place her in only a
favorable light.

The relationship between Rousseau and his Maman progresses through several
phases, truth being more complicated than ﬁction. As her goals change, the dynamics of
their relationship shift, as do the bases of power Madame de Warens uses to inﬂuence
Jean-Jacques. We must keep in mind, however, that as Rousseau recounts their
relationship and testiﬁes to the inﬂuence his Maman had on him, he often ﬁctionalizes.
As the sculptor of his own history, Rousseau fashions his image of Mme de Warens as he

wishes, alternately interpreting events to her advantage or her detriment, whichever best

78

serves his cause. As Felicity Baker points out, Rousseau’s portrait of Mme de Warens is
not objective because he knows her only in relation to himself (173). His portrayal is
further complicated by the dual nature of the self he describes Maman in relation to,
sometimes the boy she is shaping, and sometimes the man who is writing.

Madame de Warens’ ﬁrst goal is straightforward. Her relationship to Sardinia
and the Catholic Church determines the goal of her ﬁrst encounter with Rousseau. She
has little choice but to work for his conversion from the “Genevan heresy” to
Catholicism. Even though this meeting is brief, Madame de Warens cements her primary

basis of power the moment Rousseau sees her. “Rien n’échappa au rapide coup d’oeil du

 

jeune prosélyte; car je devins a l’instant le Sien, sﬁr qu’une religion préchée par de tels ‘
missionnaires ne pouvait manquer de mener en paradis” (87). Ironically, her referent
power is so great that it prevents Rousseau from doing what she thinks is best for him:
going home. Her position prevents her from directly advising the sixteen-year-old Jean-
Jacques to return home to Protestant Geneva, but she makes her thoughts clear. Rousseau

6‘

explains his reaction. ...plus je Ia trouvaiS éloquente, persuasive, plus ses discours
m’allaient au coeur, et moins je pouvais me résoudre a me de'tacher d’elle. Je sentais que
retourner a Geneve était mettre entre elle et moi une barriere presque

insurmontable. . .”(9l). Rousseau describes the immediate bond between them, an
example of “la sympathie des times”, an instant experience of “la paix du cueur, Ie calme,
la sérénité, la sécurité, l’assurance” (89, 90). His emphasis on Mme de Warens’
reluctance to send him on suggests that she shared this experience but needed to let him

go due to circumstances beyond her control. The unseemliness of a woman her age

taking in a boy of his age, the involvement of her dinner guest in making the plans, and

79

 

her obligations to the king and the bishop combine to make his staying impossible, no
matter how strong their immediate bond.

Rousseau’s thoughts as he sets off to Turin clearly express the effects of referent
power as experienced by its target. He explains, “partant pour obe’ir a Mme de Warens,
je me regardais comme vivant toujours sous sa direction; c’était plus que de vivre a son
voisinage” (92). “Je me regardais comme l’ouvrage, l’éleve, l’ami, presque l’amant de
Mme de Warens” (95). Thus, even though their encounter is brief, Rousseau is ﬁrmly
under Mme de Warens’ inﬂuence, an inﬂuence that can undoubtedly be credited with his
“conversion” at the Hospice of the Catechumens and that eventually motivates him to
leave Turin, despite his having secured an enviable position in the Solar household.
When his friend Bacle suggests they move on, Rousseau leaves without hesitation. He
explains his rash decision much later, in the Tenth Promenade: “Tout me rappelait a elle,
il y fallut revenir” (136).

Rousseau’s return marks the beginning of the second phase of their relationship.
Mme de Warens decides that because he has come back to her, she will not send him
away again despite what others may say. And so the relationship for which Rousseau had
sensed the potential blossoms. They quickly fall into the habit of addressing each other
as “Petit” and “Maman”. Rousseau explains, “Je trouve que ces deux noms rendent a
merveille l’ide’e de notre ton, la simplicite’ de nos manieres, et surtout la relation de nos
occurs” (144). The boy who “coﬁt[a] la vie a [sa] mere” has ﬁnally found a mother.
Rousseau, as he is wont to do, insists on the singularity of their relationship, intensely

‘

passionate, yet without sexual desirez. ‘. . .je voyais toujours en elle une tendre mere, une

sceur chérie, une délicieuse amie, et rien de plus. . ..Son image, toujours présente a mon

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coaur, n’y laissait place a nulle autre; elle était pour moi la seule femme qui fﬁt au monde;
et l’extréme douceur des sentiments qu’elle m’inspirait, ne laissant pas a mes sens le
temps de s’e’veiller pour d’autres, me garantissait d’elle et de tout son sexe. En un mot,
j’étais sage parce que je l’airnais. Sur ces effets, que je rends mal, dise qui pourra de
quelle espece e'tait mon attachement pour elle” (147).

An objective examination of their relationship would suggest the exercise of at
least three bases of power, legitimate position, legitimate reciprocity, and referent. As a
woman with connections to the Bishop and the King of Sardinia, Mme de Warens could
exercise legitimate position power over the son of a craftsman who has been effectively
abandoned by his family with no skills or resources. Because Mme de Warens has taken
him in and is supporting him, legitimate reciprocity might also be a reasonable basis from
which to draw power. But Rousseau acknowledges neither of these, insisting, “j’étais
sage parce que je l’aimais”. Any sense of obligation or servitude would corrupt the
idyllic picture he paints. Only a relationship based on referent power can permit
Rousseau to live his dream of transparency. Jean Starobinski describes it. “Car pour que
l’accueil soit pur, il ne doit comporter aucun lien materiel, i1 ne doit entrainer aucun
devoir de reconnaissance. Il doit signiﬁer l’union immédiate des ames, qui se savent
supérieurs et qui ont reconnu leur ressemblance” (156). The introduction of other bases
of power in later stages of their relationship signal, therefore, its deterioration. At this
point, Rousseau depicts himself engaging in activities he does not like while enjoying
himself immensely. He participates in Maman’s botany experiments, tastes her

medicines, and tolerates her steady stream of visitors. He explains, “Rien de ce qui se

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faisait autour de moi, rien de tout ce qu’on me faisait faire, n’était selon mon gout, mais
tout était selon mon coeur” (148).

Maman’s knowledge of literature and the court does grant her a degree of
informational power, but this soft basis does not impinge on the perfection of their
relationship, serving rather to meet Rousseau’s needs and to enable his growth. Their
book discussions delighted Jean-Jacques and encouraged him to read carefully and
reﬂectively. She also instructed him on the rules and practices of the court, “et c’était
précisément, vu mes idées chimériques, la sorte d’instruction dont j’avais le plus grand
besoin” (149).

Thus Rousseau experienced, in a condensed version, an ideal childhood. But boys
must grow up, and Rousseau’s need to support himself inspires Mme de Warens’ second
project for him: a career. She studies him carefully, but, blinded by her affection for him,
has difﬁculty choosing the best direction for him. So she sends him to her relative, M.
d’Aubonne, who judges him ﬁt for little else than a career as a village priest. Evidently,
either Mme de Warens’ observations were not as insightful as one would expect from
such a singular relationship, or she did not place much stock in them. Rousseau describes
the results of his Latin studies: “. . .je n’ai jamais pu rien apprendre avec des maitres,
excepté mon pere et M. Lambercier. . .Mon esprit veut marcher a son heure, il ne peut se
soumettre a celle d’autrui” (156). Of course, Rousseau has already demonstrated himself
to be considerably less passive than Saintré, for example, and certainly capable of
sabotaging a project he is unenthusiastic about. His enrollment in the seminary separates
him from Mme de Warens both in the present and in prospects for the future. Thus her

referent power works against her, undermining the project.

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Maman next decides to make him a musician. This time, her referent power does
not interfere, because Rousseau is only “a vingt pas de la maison de Maman” (159).
Music is also closely associated with Mme de Warens in Rousseau’s mind and memory
as something they often created and enjoyed together. This promising arrangement ends
abruptly when M. Le Maitre runs afoul of church leaders and decides to ﬂee to Lyon.
Mme de Warens sends Jean-Jacques with him3. After Rousseau abandons Le Maitre, his
only thought is to return to Maman. Referent power was never expressed more clearly:
“Rien ne me ﬂattait, rien ne me tentait, je n’avais de désir pour rien que pour retourner
aupres de Maman. La tendresse et la vérité de mon attachement pour elle avaient
déraciné de mon cceur tous les projets imaginaires, toutes les folies de l’ambition. Je ne
voyais plus d’autre bonheur que celui de vivre aupres d’elle, et je ne faisais pas un pas
sans sentir que je m’éloignais de ce bonheur” (167).

He returns to Annecy only to ﬁnd that Mme de Warens is gone and has left no
word on where she might be found. Without her, Rousseau wanders aimlessly, waiting
ﬁrst in Annecy, then traveling around Switzerland, to Paris, and back to Lyon, where he
ﬁnally gets word she is in Chambéry. This time, she places Rousseau as a secretary in
the ofﬁce of the royal survey.4 Though Rousseau misses the bucolic surroundings he has
come to associate with Maman, he spends the next eight or nine years peacefully. He
reads, teaches himself math, learns to draw, and develops his taste for music. He tells us
that this “vie simple et douce” was just what he needed to ﬁnish growing up.

The potential for conﬂict arises when Rousseau’s interest in music and his distaste
for his work in the survey ofﬁce combine. He wants to quit his job and devote himself to

music, an idea unpopular with Mme de Warens. She has bigger plans for him, though

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Rousseau never tells us what those may have been, and she does not see music as a way
to achieve them. But like a persistent child, Rousseau wins her over. “Enﬁn, j’extorquai
son consentement plus a force d’importunités et de caresses que de raisons dont elle se
contentat” (226).

This negotiation of plans contrasts sharply with the other Pygmalion-Galatea
relationships examined and highlights the parent-child character of the bond between
Rousseau and Mme de Warens. Madamedes Belles Cousines, Mme de Mortsauf, and the
lady of Pamplona undertook their projects without ever consulting their young men about
their preferences, nor did any of the latter express contradictory wishes. As Maman and
her Petit discuss his future, she takes into account not only her desires for his future, but
her understanding of his nature and his tastes. Realizing that if Jean-Jacques does not
quit, he may be ﬁred because he is unable to discipline himself to work hard at a job he
does not enjoy, she decides that it will be in his best interests to pursue another line of
work. Nevertheless, She maintains control. Rousseau never considers acting on his own
against her wishes though he is now in his mid-twenties. From a cynical point of view,
Rousseau’s deference could be simple self-preservation. If he deﬁed his protector, his
standard of living would drop considerably and he would lose his contacts with
Chambéry society. If these factors had inﬂuenced Rousseau’s behavior, Madame de
Warens would have exercised reward and legitimate position power . But Rousseau
makes no mention of any such consideration. He depicts his deference to her will as the
result of her referent power alone. He loved her and so he obeyed. There is not even the
glimmer of coercive power in the form of a threat to end the relationship in the face of

non-compliance, a threat we have seen in all the preceding relationships examined. This

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absence further underlines the maternal nature of their relationship. This is not a tie that
can be broken off at will or easily outgrown.

The salience of the maternal characteristics of their relationship, recounted in such
close proximity to the beginning of its third phase, renders the trauma of Rousseau’s
sexual initiation more vivid. When he quits the survey ofﬁce, Rousseau gives music
lessons as a means of earning a living, a change he ﬁnds completely satisfying. In the
process, he attracts attention from some of his students’ mothers. Mme Lard in particular
makes repeated advances which Rousseau is too naive to recognize. Mme de Menthon, a
rival of Mme de Warens, takes a similar interest in Jean—Jacques. To prevent these
women from instructing her student, Mme de Warens decides it is time to treat Jean-
Jacques like a man.

Rousseau’s view of their relationship, that of mother and son, presents him with
serious reservations about this new phase of their relationship. After two pages of
rumination and explanation, he arrives at the conclusion that it is the ﬁlial nature of his
feelings that prevents him from looking forward to his initiation. When he ﬁrst met Mme
de Warens in Annecy, there was a sensual element in his feelings for her, but “[l]a longue
habitude de vivre ensemble et d’y vivre innocemment, loin d’affaiblir mes sentiments
pour elle, les avait renforcés, mais leur avait en meme temps donne une autre tournure
qui les rendaient plus affectueux, plus tendres peut-étre, mains moins sensuels. A force
de l’appeler Maman, a force d’user avec elle de la familiarité d’un ﬁls, je m’e'tais
accoutumé a me regarder comme tel”(234). This instance of conﬂict between Maman’s
decision to have a sexual relationship with Jean-Jacques and his unwillingness to do so

provides fertile ground in which to examine the bases of power Mme de Warens draws

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on to achieve Rousseau’s compliance. For the ﬁrst time, we see her bases of power
broaden, but this broadening of powers implies the corruption of Rousseau’s ideal of
transparency, a perfect relationship that can admit the exercise of referent power only and
is purest when desire is absent. 5 It is necessary, however, because Rousseau ﬁnds
himself in a new situation. In the context of his life with Maman, he has had to
participate in activities not to his liking, including botanical experiments and seemingly
endless social visits from streams of visitors. But his distaste for these activities has
always been compensated by the pleasure he takes in being near Mme de Warens. Now,
the source of his discomfort comes from within the relationship itself.

Rousseau gives two reasons for not telling her that his sexual initiation is
unnecessary, “premiérement parce que ce n’était pas une chose a dire, et puis parce
qu’au fond je sentais que cela n’était pas vrai, et qu’en effet il n’y avait qu’une femme
qui pﬁt me garantir des autres femmes et me mettre a l’épreuve des tentations. Sans
désirer de la posséder, j’étais bien aise qu’elle m’otat le désir d’en posséder d’autres; tant
je regardais tout ce qui pouvait me distraire d’elle comme un malheur” (234). His second
reason explicitly reveals the functioning of expert and reward power. Mme de Warens is
the only one with the knowledge and skill, both in matters of love and in her protégé’s
character, who can provide him with the experience he needs to attain the reward She
offers, the reward of protection from distraction in the form of other women.6 Thus, her
power is compounded as she offers not only the reward, but also the means to achieve it,
both of which lead back to her most stable basis of power, her referent power. This
brings us back to his ﬁrst reason, “ce n’était pas une chose a dire”. While social

expectation may play a role in his unwillingness to say no, more importantly, a refusal of

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Maman’s offer would call her expert power into question and jeopardize the spiritual
intimacy of their relationship. He is right to fear such an outcome. When Rousseau
returns from Montpellier and ﬁnds that Wintzenreid has taken his place, his refusal to
sleep with Mme de Warens results in the isolation he wanted to avoid. He explains, “La
privation que je m’e’tais imposée et qu’elle avait fait semblant d’approuver est une de ces
choses que les femmes ne pardonnent point... Des lors je cessai de trouver en elle cette
intimité des cmurs qui ﬁt toujours la plus douce jouissance du mien” (303).

The bases of power Mme de Warens does not draw on reveal aspects of their
relationship as well. She continues to make no use of coercive power, nor does she draw
on the power of legitimate reciprocity, a basis of power that is certainly available to her
given all she has done for Rousseau. But Rousseau’s insistence on the selﬂessness of this
act and the absence of her desire underline her unwillingness to exercise this power. Her
lack of desire marked her relationships with the Colonel de Tavel, Claude Anet, and later,
Rousseau’s successor, Wintzenreid as well. Due to this lack, Rousseau preserves his
image of her as an example of a unique brand of feminine virtue. Her heart is chaste,
though her reason was corrupted by her ﬁrst lover (235). One sees glimmers here of
Rousseau’s attacks on the salonniéres, the danger of too much intelligence and wit in a
woman, and the importance of a good and simple heart as seen in his characterization of
Sophie, Emile’s ideal woman. Mme de Warens was, in Rousseau’s estimation, the victim
of the corrupting inﬂuence of the wrong kind of education. Though his readers may
judge her unfavorably for her liberality with her sexual favors, Rousseau insists that she

was never motivated to dispense them merely for her own sexual pleasure, but rather for

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the emotional and spiritual joy of bringing the men she loved into greater intimacy and
devotion.

In his relationship with Mme de Warens, Rousseau is powerless, so when she
decides to initiate him sexually, he cannot refuse despite his apprehensions. In order to
avoid portraying himself as a victim, Rousseau rationalizes his acceptance of her “offer”,
laying forth an argument for why he should be anticipating the consummation of their
relationship. His adolescent male sex drive, his desire for sexual initiation, his adoration
of Mme de Warens, and her lasting beauty and desirability should result in eager l
anticipation, but he fails to convince himself. He asks himself and his reader, “Comment,

au lieu des délices qui devaient m’enivrer, sentais-je presque de la répugnance et des I

 

craintes? Il n’y point a douter que, si j’avais pu me dérober 21 mon bonheur avec
bienséance, je ne l’eusse fait de tout mon cceur” (233). Rousseau labels his reaction a
“bizzarrerie”, but given the mother-son dynamic of their relationship coupled with
Rousseau’s nearly complete lack of power within it, his apprehensions are completely
understandable.

Nevertheless, the initiation occurs, leaving Rousseau feeling “comme si j’avais
commis un inceste” (235). Afterwards, woven into accounts of the deepening of his
relationship with Mme de Warens and the ensuing me’nage a trois that includes Claude
Anet, Rousseau begins to Show signs of psychological distress brought on by the
exploitative sexual relationship in which he is involved. He attempts to escape the
physical aspect of their relationship by putting physical distance between them. Unable
to control Mme de Warens’ spending after Claude Anet’s death, Rousseau’s solution to

provide for her entails leaving Chambe'ry for Besancon. 7 When his plan fails, Rousseau

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ﬁnds reprieve in two and three day errands for Mme de Warens. He also escapes into
fantasy. He explains, “J ’avais une tendre mere, une amie chérie; mais il me fallait une
maitresse. Je me la ﬁgurais a sa place; je me la créais de mille facons pour me donner le
change a moi-meme. Si j’avais cru tenir Maman dans mes bras quand je l’y tenais, mes
e'treintes n’auraient pas été moins vives, mais tous mes désirs se seraient éteints, j’aurais
sangloté dc tendresse, mais je n’aurais pas joui “ (255).

Rousseau’s escapism does not successfully insulate him from the damage this
relationship is inﬂicting. He ﬁnds himself constantly on edge, a state he attributes to
Maman’s ﬁnancial situation and fear of the separation it may eventually bring, but that
could also be explained by their continued sexual relationship. Rousseau begins to
manifest signs of depression, a frequent consequence of molestation. He describes his
emotional state: “Me sentant affaiblir, je devins plus tranquille et perdis un peu la fureur
des voyages. Plus sédentaire, je fus pris non de l’ennui, mais de la mélancolie; les
vapeurs succéderent aux passions; ma langueur devint tristesse; je pleurais et soupirais a
propos de rien; je sentais la vie m’échapper sans l’avoir goﬁtée...” (257).

Rousseau then becomes ill, discovering the only basis of power available to him:
legitimate dependence, the power of the powerless. His illness improves both situations
in which he was experiencing impotence, ﬁrst in the nature of his relationship with Mme
de Warens, and second, in his inability to resolve her ﬁnancial problems. “Elle me
soigna comme jamais mere n’a soigne' son enfant, et cela lui ﬁt du bien a elle-meme, en
faisant diversion aux projets et tenant e’carte's les projeteurs” (25 8). His illness pushes
Maman out of the role of sex partner into a maternal role and distracts her from the

people and projects that are hastening her ﬁnancial ruin. He uses its lingering effects to

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convince her to move to les Charmettes for the summer, where he experiences “le court
bonheur de [s]a vie”. Rousseau’s power of legitimate dependence does little to even the
balance of power between them, and so he undergoes a series of illnesses to maintain
what little power he has. A new illness provides a reason for an extended absence from a
situation that may have been becoming intolerable. Wintzenreid’s presence, although not
mentioned until Rousseau returns, but noted by his biographers as beginning well before
his departure, may have been the cause of the illness that sent Rousseau to Montpellier.
When his symptoms fail to produce the sympathy and nurturing they had in the past,
Rousseau employs them as a new excuse to travel, his original means of escape. His
forgetting his illness when he meets Mme de Lanarge emphasizes the psychosomatic
nature of this problem, and, very likely, of those that preceded it. While Rousseau claims
that his need for a mistress was responsible for his health problems, chances are equally
good that the one he had was making him sick.

The type of power imbalance we see between Rousseau and Mme de Warens may
be appropriate to a relationship between parent and child, but not between lovers. Its
aberrant nature is difﬁcult to recognize because Rousseau works so hard to camouﬂage it.
Rousseau’s affection, attachment, and gratitude toward Mme de Warens are real,
demonstrated by his return to them in the last published piece he wrote before his death.
In the tenth promenade, he still longs for the “transparence des ames” that he shared with
her, and recognizes the critical role she played in shaping his life and allowing him to
become the man he is. He has nothing to gain by blaming her for the damage she has
done, and may not even realize it himself, although his failure to form and maintain an

intimate relationship with any woman who approaches equality with him on any level

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may reveal its extent. As a result, Rousseau devotes much of his narrative energy, not
only in the Tenth Promenade, but in the Confessions as well, to praising Mme de Warens’
beauty, generosity, openness, charm, wit, and grace, hardly the portrait of a child
molester.

The context of their relationship also shields Mme de Warens from blame. Before
he recounts his sexual relationship with his adoptive mother, Rousseau has already
shocked readers with confessions ﬁrst of his enjoyment of spankings from Mlle
Lambercier, and then his exhibitionism, masturbation, fetishistic ﬁxation on Mme de
Warens’ possessions, and homosexual close calls. After this list of behaviors that fall
decidedly outside the norm of what people are willing to talk about, if not participate in, a
borderline incestuous relationship simply follows an established pattern of abnormality.
At least it involves a consenting other. The important point here is that Rousseau
himself does not consent, but to recognize this requires readers to stop viewing Rousseau
as a deviant and start viewing him as the victim of a woman he has painted in warm,
glowing colors, a difficult transition to make.

Rousseau then absolves his benefactress of any vestige of guilt by insisting on her
lack of desire. As he tries to come to terms with this change in their relationship during
the week between the offer and its consummation, he analyzes her motives. “Je
connaissais trop son cueur chaste et son temperament de glace pour croire un moment que
le plaisir des sens eﬁt aucune part a cet abandon d’elle-méme: j’e'tais parfaitement sﬁr
que le seul soin de m’arracher a des dangers autrement presque inévitables, et de me
conserver tout entier a moi et a mes devoirs, lui en faisait enfreindre un qu’elle ne

regardait pas du méme oeil que les autres femmes...” (234). His apology for her behavior

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"It

 

continues after his narration of their liaison with a portrayal of her own victimization at
the hands of the colonel de Tavel from whom she adopted the principle that inﬁdelity is
wrong only when it causes scandal. Rousseau goes on to recognize that, despite the harm
Tavel did to his young protégée by his instruction on this point, his teaching beneﬁted
Mme de Warens “sur mille autres” (236). By placing her in Tavel’s role in her
relationship to Rousseau, he forgives her the error of pushing him into sexual relations in
light of the tremendous beneﬁts she bestows and a purity of intentions intensiﬁed by her
lack of physical desire. “Par combien de vertus ne rachetait-elle pas ses faiblesses, si l’on
peut appeler de ce nom des erreurs oil les sens avaient si peu de part!...Ses motifs étaient

louables jusque dans ses fautes; en S’abusant elle pouvait mal faire, mais elle ne pouvait

 

vouloir rien qui fut mal” (236). 8 Thus Rousseau recognizes that his Maman damaged
him, but stops short of fully blaming her. James O’Rourke analyzes Rousseau’s
estimation of Mme de Warens’s responsibility for the wrong she did him as a failure to
understand the effects of the attachments she created and the responsibility she carried in
wielding the power they granted her (59).

Rousseau furthers his attempt to minimize the harm done by his sexual
relationship with Mme de Warens by emphasizing positive changes that occurred in their
relationship soon after his sexual initiation. Rousseau is pleased to discover that Mme de
Warens now treats him like a man in more ways than just in her bed. “Elle m’avait
jusqu’alors parlé de moi seul comme a un enfant. Elle commenca de me traiter en
homme, et me parla d’elle” (237). This greater intimacy opens the door to a third project
of transformation. Mme de Warens has converted Rousseau to Catholicism, given him a

safe environment in which to mature, and tried setting him on four different career paths.

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Now she undertakes a new phase in his education. “L’intimité dans laquelle je vivais
avec elle l’ayant mise a portée de m’appre’cier plus avantageusement qu’elle n’avait fait,
elle jugea que, malgré mon air gauche, je valais la peine d’étre cultivé pour le monde, et
que, si je m’y montraiS un jour sur un certain pied, je serais en état d’y faire mon chemin.
Sur cette idée, elle s’attachait non seulement a former mon jugement, mais mon extérieur,
mes manieres, a me rendre aimable autant qu’estirnable” (23 7).

To this project, Mme de Warens brings her considerable expert power. “Car Mme
de Warens connaissait les hommes et savait supérieurement l’art de traiter avec eux sans
mensonge et sans imprudence, sans les tromper et sans les facher” (238). Nonetheless, it
is doomed to failure, not because of Jean-Jacques’s resistance, but because of his lack of
aptitude. “Mais cet art était dans son caractere bien plus que dans ses lecons; et j’étais
l’homme du monde 1e moins propre a l’apprendre” (23 8). The lessons in dance and arms
did not fare any better. Despite Rousseau’s dismal assessment of his progress in this
area, Cranston notes that Jean-Jacques must have had some success because he felt
accepted and at ease in Chambe'ry society (111).

Though Mme de Warens’ project to make Rousseau ﬁt for society met with
limited success, the greater intimacy between them gives her a new basis of power, one
she will continue to exercise even after Rousseau leaves her home. For the ﬁrst time,
Rousseau expresses a desire to make Maman happy, a reﬂection of her power of
legitimate reciprocity. He describes himself as “[l]ivré tout entier au désir de rendre a
Maman la vie heureuse. . .” (23 8). Rousseau’s desire to take responsibility for Mme de
Warens demonstrates his growing maturity, a maturity necessary for Maman’s power of

legitimate reciprocity to become effective. His desire to provide for Mme de Warens

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motivates his decision to go to Besancon to become a composer as well as his departure
for Paris to present his new system of musical notation. The power of legitimate
reciprocity is also responsible for his return from Montpellier and his bypassing of Mme
de Lanarge.

Though Rousseau’s sexual initiation marks the beginning of a new phase in their
relationship, it also marks the beginning of its end, an end foreshadowed by the
introduction of bases of power other than referent. This end is hastened by Claude Anet’s
death. Despite Rousseau’s insistence on the singularity of their me’nage (‘1 trois and
Madame de Warens’ ability to inspire love for each other among the people she loved,

Rousseau’s biographers speculate that Anet was not as content with the situation as I

 

Rousseau liked to pretend, and that the “accident” that took his life was really a second,
successful suicide attempt (Cranston 110). Losing Anet constituted the loss not only of a
lover, but also of a household manager who kept Mme de Warens’ ﬁnances from
complete disaster. After his death, Rousseau takes on this role, but without the same
success. He does not have the bases of power needed to control Maman’s spending and
the household quickly descends into ﬁnancial ruin. He is also uneasy in his role as
Maman’s lover. He attributes his increased travel after Anet’s death to unwillingness to
watch Mme de Warens’ ﬁnancial ruin, but in nearly the same breath, he reiterates his
discomfort with the sexual aspect of their relationship and his need for a mistress (256).

Rousseau blames the brevity of his happiness on Maman, though we can see why
this Pygmalion may be ready to abandon her project. In Balzac’s Lys dans la vallée,
Fe’lix ﬁlls all the empty roles in Henriette’s life: son, companion, conﬁdant, and

confessor. Jean-Jacques limits his part to that of child, and is unable to meet any of Mme

94

de Warens’ other needs. He is an incompetent household manager, and is unwilling to
satisfy her sexually. Despite Rousseau’s insistence that she is without passion, his
abstinence is clearly a sore subject. As tension between them increases, Rousseau once
again falls ill.

Although Rousseau and Mme de Warens have been separated before when she
sent him to Turin and Lyon, his departure for Montpellier to seek a cure most closely
parallels the “rite of passage” separation seen in previous gender-reversed Pygmalion-
Galatea relationships. The lukewarm success Mme de Warens has had with her prote’gé
is demonstrated by Rousseau’s failure to metarnorphose. He has not acquired knowledge
to apply or skills to hone that will transform him from an insecure adolescent into a
successful man. Saintré’s successive quests take him from timid page to decorated
knight. When F e'lix returns from Paris to the Touraine, the conﬁdent young man who has
replaced the needy boy she ﬁrst met takes Mme de Mortsauf aback. These
transformations are the direct result of the training the young men received from their
mentors. Rousseau manages to ﬁnd the mistress he had been wanting, but even this small
success is tempered by the passive role he plays in it. Not only does his affair come
about as the result of Mme de Lanarge’s persistent pursuit, but he engages in it while
role-playing. Mr. Dudding is bold enough to respond to the obvious advances of his
admirer, but we doubt whether Jean-Jacques would be. Rousseau’s only achievement
while he was away is one he has to hide from Mme de Warens. He has done nothing to
make her proud.

In this light, Rousseau’s narration of his decision to return to Maman instead of

going to see Mme de Lanarge appears as an attempt to salvage what has otherwise been

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I " —_ 44

an unsuccessful trip. Overcome with guilt at abandoning his kind, generous, and debt-
ridden Maman, he invents a series of reasons for not visiting Mme de Lanarge: fear of
being exposed as a fraud (an Englishman who has never been to England and speaks no
English), fear of mistreatment or resentment from her family, fear of falling in love with
her daughter, whom he has never met, and bringing discord, dishonor, and scandal to the
household. Peter France points out the unlikelihood of this scenario given Rousseau’s
previous timidity in matters of love, judging Rousseau’s casting of the incident in this
light as an attempt to portray heroic self-denial (92). He heads for home with an entirely
new sensation: “Je mérite ma propre estime: je sais préférer mon devoir a mon plaisir”

(298). He admits pride may have played a role in his decision, but concludes, “si cet

 

orgueil n’est pas la vertu meme, il a des effets si semblables, qu’il est pardonnable de s’y
tromper”. Thus, he returns to les Charmettes a new man, at least in his own eyes. “Sitot
que j’eus pris ma resolution je devins un autre homme, ou plutot je redevins celui que
j’e'tais auparavant, et que ce moment d’ivresse avait fait disparaitre. Plein de bons
sentiments et de bonnes resolutions, je continuai ma route dans la bonne intention
d’expier ma faute, ne pensant qu’a re’gler desormais ma conduite sur les lois de la vertu, a
me consacrer sans re’serve au service de la meilleure des meres, a lui vouer autant de
ﬁde'lité que j’avais d’attachement pour elle, eta n’écouter plus d’autre amour que celui de
mes devoirs” (298). These resolutions result from Mme de Warens’ exercise of power,
even from a distance. Rousseau’s use of the adjectives “bonne” and “généreuse” in his
description of Maman indicate his desire to compensate her kindness with his loyalty, the
result of the power of legitimate reciprocity. This soft basis of power, springing as it

does from his own desire to give back to the woman who has given him so much, could

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ﬁnd a place in Rousseau’s conception of an ideal relationship. But he recalls her
precarious ﬁnancial situation and acknowledges his role in it even as he spends money on
his travels, travels that have included inﬁdelity. His desire to “expier [sa] faute” stems
from Mme de Warens’ power of legitimate equity. Rousseau has wronged her and now
holds himself responsible for damages. Though Rousseau has not revealed to his readers
that Maman has replaced him with another man, we can already read in his sense of
obligation and in his recourse to love of duty a fall from the paradise described in the
Tenth Promenade, a code of behavior he summarizes, “j’e’tais sage parce que je l’aimais”.

Despite the diminished transparency that Jean-Jacques’s newfound sense of virtue

and loyalty imply, Rousseau emphasizes them to heighten the betrayal that follows. Like %

 

Saintré, he returns ready to take his place beside his lady only to ﬁnd that a rival he
considers inferior has replaced him. Rousseau does not give up immediately, but attempts
to rejoin their society, hoping to mentor Wintzenreid as Anet had mentored him. This
relationship proves impossible because he has no power to exert over the young man he
would like to make his prote’ge’. He has no wealth or social standing to endow him with
reward or legitimate position power, no knowledge Wintzenreid is interested in to
provide him expert or informational power, and no meaningful relationship that
Wintzenreid wants to build or maintain to serve as the basis for referent power. Anet, on
the other hand, exercised legitimate position power as manager of the household, both
over Rousseau and Maman.9 He also exercised a transitive referent power. Maman was
closely tied to Anet, Rousseau to Maman, and therefore, Rousseau to Anet. He explains
how this came to be: “Comme elle savait que je ne pensais, ne sentais, ne respirais que

par elle, elle me montrait combien elle l’aimait, aﬁn que je l’aimasse de méme, et elle

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appuyait encore moins sur son amitié pour lui que sur son estime, parce que c’e’tait le
sentiment que je pouvais partager le plus pleinement” (239).

As we have seen, Rousseau’s unwillingness to Share Maman offends her, dealing
a further blow to their weakened relationship. As a result, the closeness they shared
evaporates. Unable to play a secondary role in a household where he had once been
everything, Rousseau decides to leave. '0 After spending a year away, he returns once
more, hoping to re-establish their relationship, but Rousseau is forced to realize that the
transparency of souls he once experienced will never be restored. Despite their
separation, Mme de Warens continues to exercise power over Rousseau, but the two main

bases of power she draws on betray her weakened status. Her referent power having I

 

evaporated with their relationship, she is left with the legitimate powers of reciprocity,
equity, and dependence, the same powers aging mothers often exercise over their adult
children. The desire to provide for his Maman becomes Jean-Jacques’s primary
motivation to succeed. In the Tenth Promenade, he explains, “Je pensai qu’une provision
de talents était la plus sure ressource contre la misere, et je résolus d’employer mes loisirs
a me mettre en état, s’il était possible, de rendre un jour a la meilleure des femmes
l’assistance que j’en avais recue” (137).

This Pygmalion-Galatea relationship ends with a whimper. There are no deathbed
confessions of concealed love, no dramatic revelations of secret liaisons. They simply
part ways, maintaining a spotty correspondence over the years until Mme de Warens’
death. Thus Mme de Warens is the ﬁrst female Pygmalion ﬁgure to emerge from the
relationship alive and intact. In fact, the effects of the relationship on her appear to be

relatively few. Rousseau depicts her replacing him with Wintzenreid as easily as she

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might replace a household servant. She viewed the change as purely practical, since
Rousseau did not manage the household well and was gone frequently. She suffered
economic hardships that worsened after Rousseau’s departure, but these resulted from
spending habits that had been in place before Rousseau knew her. Her encouragement of
Rousseau’s musical talents paid off in at least a limited fashion, since Rousseau used his
income to help support her. The largest impact was on her reputation. By writing her,
Rousseau reversed the Pygmalion process, transforming an ordinary woman into an
immortal work of art. Yet many condemned his portrait, accusing him of destroying her
reputation. Raymond Trousson recounts the criticisms lodged by the public prosecutor

Servan in the years following the publication of the Confessions. He cites Mme de

 

Warens as an example of those injured by his revelations, arguing that Rousseau’s praise
of her goodness and generosity cannot make up for the damage done to her honor and
modesty (63). In the century that followed, George Sand wrote in her own
autobiography, perhaps thinking of her relationship with Musset, “Qui peut lui pardonner
d’avoir confesse madame de Warens en méme temps que lui?” (13). Honoré de Balzac,
who found his own maternal Pygmalion in Mme de Bemy, criticized Rousseau for his
ungratefulness to the woman who had given him so much (Maurois 86). However, Mme
de Warens never experienced the damage to her reputation that her defenders decried.
Rousseau did not begin writing the Confessions until 1762, the year of her death. He did
not submit a manuscript until ﬁve years later, and did not read them publicly until 1770.
Compared to Madamedes Belles Cousines, the lady of Parnplona, and Mme de Mortsauf,

she ended her relationship to Rousseau with relatively few consequences.

Rousseau cannot say enough about the impact Mme de Warens had on his life,
but the real effects of their relationship are difﬁcult to measure. Rousseau credits her
with forming his reason and judgment, and giving him room to discover his true nature,
yet these outcomes are only loosely related to the actual projects she forms and attempts
to implement. He does succeed as a musician, a pursuit she encouraged, but her other
attempts at occupational counseling as well as her efforts to make him ﬁt for society meet
with failure. The primary reason for her limited success is that she never demands that
Rousseau comply. Saintré bows to reward and legitimate position power, and Félix de l
Vandenesse and d’Avannes both modify their behavior due to coercive power in the form

of a threat to end the relationship. Maman never takes recourse to these hard bases of {

 

power and never effects the changes she undertakes. She does not devote herself single-
mindedly to the task of shaping her protégé as do her counterparts, but adds Rousseau to
her list of projects and activities, which explains her frequent distractions and the
apparent ease with which she replaces him. Mme de Warens has a history of abandoning
unsuccessful enterprises, so when Rousseau fails to live up to her expectations, she
moves on, but not without leaving a lasting impression on Jean-Jacques. Their
relationship becomes the mark by which he will measure all others.

None of Rousseau’s later relationships meet this standard, but this ideal of
freedom within the bonds of a relationship, “j’étais sage parce que je l’aimais,” translates
into his educational philosophy. Emile should never feel his education imposed on him,
but rather as a means to satisfy his natural curiosity. When he reaches adolescence, a

time when children become difﬁcult, his tutor will maintain control because of Emile’s

attachment to him, a “bridle of affection” (521). For Rousseau, control solely through the

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exercise of referent power is the resolution to the tension between natural man’s freedom
and society’s bonds.
* * alt

Rousseau credits Mme de Warens with a key role in shaping the man he became.
Rousseau, in turn, inﬂuenced many of the writers and thinkers who followed him,
whether they adopted his principles or reacted against them. George Sand did both. Her
initial reaction to his writing, recorded in her Histoire de ma vie, was one of
unadulterated admiration for his ideas, tempered with a distaste for his personal character.
She found reading Rousseau to be a revelation, inspiring new ideas and insights
(1060,61). She follows in his footsteps as She writes her autobiography, acknowledging
his inﬂuence, but she is careful to distinguish between his Confessions and her Histoire.
As we have seen, she is particularly critical of Rousseau’s confessing others while baring
his own soul, especially as he casts aspersions on Mme de Warens’ character. “On
aimerait que Rousseau se fﬁt laissé accuser de légereté et d’ingratitude envers madame de
Warens, plutét que d’apprendre par lui des détails qui souillent l’image de sa bienfaitrice”
(II, 113). Rousseau inﬂuenced much more than her autobiographical project. Janet
Hiddleston notes that in Rousseau’s combination of true religious feeling and optimistic
belief in humanity, Sand found a kindred spirit. Once she ﬁnished her autobiography,
she returned to her initial enthusiasm, even making a pilgrimage to Les Charmettes,
where she wrote, “je lui reste ﬁdéle comme au pére qui m’aurait engendre’”. (Didier 255).
In addition to her autobiography and her political and religious thought, Rousseau’s ideas
inﬂuenced Sand’s ﬁction. Helynne H. Hansen examines the progression of Sand’s

heroines from women who vainly seek Rousseau-style love to those who speciﬁcally

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protest and ultimately reject the restrictions his ideas place on them (189). Indiana and
Lélia fall into this ﬁrst category as they, like Rousseau’s Julie, fail to integrate passion
and marriage. Hansen identiﬁes Mauprat as the turning point in Sand’s writing. Edmée
refers speciﬁcally to Julie and rejects her fate. Rather than accepting a false choice
between passion and marriage, Edmée shapes Bernard into the man she wants, refusing to
marry him until he proves himself worthy and capable of integrating romantic love and
enduring companionship. Isidora goes one step further, offering two routes to happiness:
the ﬁrst, followed by Alice, integrates passion and marriage, while Isidora follows a
second path, rejecting men completely and building a relationship with her daughter.

This heroine speaks speciﬁcally about her feelings for Rousseau, telling a friend that he

 

did not understand women, their needs, or their rightful place in society. Hansen
concludes, “The struggle to free herself and her heroines from the bonds of Rousseau’s
idealized, but oppressive Clarens was a long and difﬁcult one for Sand. However, her
perceptions of Rousseau grew clearer and her expression bolder, as she created heroines
who were less and less willing to accept the lot of Julie. With the development of
Isidora, Sand’s metamorphosis is achieved, as her heroine not only breaks away from
Rousseau’s long-dominant but destructive female stereotype, but also boldly denounces it
by name as an unrealistic and cruel attitude towards women “ (195).

Sand’s Jacques, whose protagonist is identiﬁed by Octave as “une mauvaise copie
de M. de Wolmar” continues her interaction with Rousseau’s ideas. Jacinta Wright
discusses its plot inversion of Rousseau’s Julie in detail. Femande rejects her husband,
the older Jacques, in favor of the younger Octave precisely because his admirable

masculine qualities of bravery, strength, and self-control prevent their happiness in

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marriage. Jacques then commits suicide to free Fernande to happily marry his rival.
Sand thus undermines patriarchal conventions of masculinity and posits her own
deﬁnition of an ideal man (201).

Through these novels, we see Sand in dialogue with her mentor, a dialogue that
continues in Francois le champi. Already in the introduction, the author’s companion
and reader, R, tells her, “Je voudrais étre paysan... je serais aussi heureux que l’homme
primitif réve’ par Jean-Jacques” (13). Sand’s novel illustrates many of Rousseau’s dearest
causes: a love of country life, a deep admiration for the hardworking virtue of the peasant
class, an emphasis on the importance of women in the nurturing and education of

Children, and a recognition of the importance of “la transparence des times” in meaningful
relationships. But this story is not just a novelized Emile. While Rousseau admired the
peasant class and found it a good source of valuable skills and life lessons in the
education of his noble student, Sand makes her hero a true member of the peasant class,
and of its lowest rung. ”
Rousseau’s philosophical writings are not the only intertext here. Many elements
Of Sand’s novel evoke Rousseau’s own life story, particularly his relationship with Mme
de Warens. In Francois, she demonstrates that although she disagrees with Rousseau’s
confessing of Mme de Warens, she believes that the type of relationship Jean-Jacques and
his Maman shared can be successful. Its failure was not due to the intrinsic nature of
their bond, but to mistakes they both made. This is not to say that Francois le champi is
a deliberate ﬁctional rewriting of Rousseau’s story. The issues Sand deals with and her
approaches to them in this novel are in no way foreign to her work as a whole, as we

would expect due to the inﬂuence Rousseau had on Sand’s thought and writing.

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However, there are enough similarities between the two narratives to justify a side-by-
side comparison, and to read their points of difference as Sand’s critique of Rousseau’s
relationship with his maternal Pygmalion ﬁgure.

Both Francois and Jean-Jacques are young boys without anyone to properly care
for them. Francois has la Zabelle and Rousseau has his father, but neither of these
guardians is entirely ﬁt. Francois’s status as a champi may be Sand’s ﬁrst implied
criticism of Rousseau, the father of no fewer than ﬁve children whom he, like Francois’s
mother, left at orphanages. Both have the good fortune to encounter lovely,
compassionate benefactresses. Madeleine embodies Mme de Warens’ qualities of
generosity, kindness, and nurturing without her “ﬂaws” of hypersociability and her
unfeminine love for science and politics. Madeleine’s maternal responsibilities fulﬁll
her, supplemented by her charity toward those around her. Like Mme de Warens’
“adoption” of Rousseau, Madeleine’s responsibility for Francois passes through two
stages. She ﬁrst helps la Zabelle and Francois as a pair, an arrangement in which la
Zabelle retains the responsibility of caring for Francois. This distant involvement
parallels Mme de Warens’ role in sending Rousseau to Turin. But when Madeleine’s
mother-in-law convinces la Zabelle to send Francois away, Madeleine intervenes. She
gives la Zabelle the money mere Blanchet had promised and takes Francois as her own, a
full acceptance like that granted Rousseau on his return to Annecy.

Sand idealizes not only the mother ﬁgure, but also the setting. She ampliﬁes
Rousseau’s appreciation of the green Space outside his window in Annecy into an entirely
rural setting, far from the corrupting inﬂuence of city life. In this ideal setting develops a

relationship of Rousseauistic perfection. Francois ﬁnds in Madeleine the mother he

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never had. His only complaint is that she does not kiss him as other mothers do their
sons, and as Madeleine herself does Jeannie, a complaint Madeleine quickly resolves
(67,8). Like Rousseau and Mme de Warens, they share a transparency of thought and
feeling, ﬁrst seen in Madeleine’s recognition of a kindred spirit in Francois, and later in
Francois’s willingness to talk to Madeleine more openly than with anyone else (42, 70).
Their relationship progresses along the same path as Rousseau’s. Madeleine begins by
meeting Francois’s basic needs, ﬁrst for food and shelter, and then for affection. Once
Madeleine has established her responsibility for Francois, she undertakes his education,
teaching him to read. AS they use the lives of saints as their reader, Madeleine shares her
simple, honest faith. Her success in these endeavors is quickly reﬂected in Francois’s
teaching Jeannie to read and the celebration of his ﬁrst communion. At the same time,
Francois ﬁnds his place in society. Given the rural setting, this is not as complicated a
task as that which befell Mme de Warens. There are no choices to be made between the
priesthood, a music career, or a position with connections to powerful people. Francois
simply enters paid service at the Blanchet mill. To reach her goals for her prote'gé,
Madeleine, like Mme de Warens, relies almost exclusively on referent power. Her
position as his adoptive mother and her meeting of his needs would suggest the
availability of the legitimate powers of position and reciprocity, but there is no evidence
that She ever needed to exercise either. “J ’e’tais sage parce que je l’aimais” could be
Francois’s description of his behavior just as easily as it is Rousseau’s.

As with Rousseau, the advent of F rancois’s maturity forces a shift in the
relationship between adoptive mother and son. For Mme de Warens, the attention her

protége’ began receiving from other women forced her to act, leading her to initiate sexual

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relations between them. Other people force a change in the relationship between
Francois and Madeleine as well. The ﬁrst glimmer of social disapproval arises in
Catherine’s criticism of Madeleine, who thinks Francois is too old for kisses from his
mother. Sand emphasizes F rancois’s innocence, a reﬂection of Rousseau’s philosophy,
in her depiction of his complete lack of comprehension of this censure. He stops
expecting kisses only to save Madeleine from criticism. Despite this minor setback in the
relationship, they continue to be close, and Madeleine continues to wield impressive
referent power, shaping and reinforcing his character as she does when Francois sees
Madeleine’s sacriﬁces to help those around her and follows suit, refusing most of his
wages for his work at the mill.

La Se’vere, Blanchet’s mistress, causes the major disruption in their relationship.
Like Mme de Menthon and Mme Lard, she notices this “diablement beau garcon”, and is
further encouraged by his cleanliness, a trait instilled by her rival, Madeleine. Francois,
like Rousseau, is completely oblivious to her designs on him and interprets her actions as
mockery rather than ﬂirtation, more evidence of his innocence. Out of revenge for his
lack of interest, La Sévere tells Blanchet that Francois tried to seduce her and intimates
that he should worry about Madeleine as well. This leads to a confrontation between
Blanchet and his wife in which Sand further emphasizes the chasteness of the relationship
between Madeleine and Francois. Blanchet’s recognition of his wife’s virtue manifests
itself in the embarrassment he feels as he begins his accusation, further underlined by
Madeleine’s initial incomprehension of his suggestion. Francois displays a similar lack
of understanding, although, unlike Madeleine, he never understands why he has to leave.

Madeleine, too ashamed of her husband’s suspicions, cannot bring herself to explain,

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simply relying on the maternal nature of relationship. “Tous les enfants quittent leur
mere pour aller travailler” (113). Francois ﬁnally accepts, but asks for a last kiss, the
kind of request that might raise eyebrows. However, the narrators, mere Monique and
the chanvreur, both intrude to emphasize the spirit of religious devotion in which it is
given (1 17).

Sand could not be clearer on the absence of any sexual undertones to their
relationship, her determined avoidance of any suggestion of incest clearly differentiating
this relationship from that of Rousseau and Mme de Warens. For Francois, the passage
to manhood consists of taking on the adult responsibilities of earning a living and caring
for others. No sexual initiation occurs, either before his departure, during his absence, or
after his return. Rather, he displays his virtue and maturity by avoiding entanglements
with both la Sévere and Mariette, the mistress and the coquette. When Mme de Warens
tells Rousseau the time has come for her to treat him like a man (“me traiter en home”),
she refers exclusively to the opening of sexual relations between them. While this leads
to a deepening of their relationship and a willingness to treat Jean-Jacques as more of an
equal and less of a child, this shift occurs only in their interpersonal dynamics. There is
no indication that Rousseau assumed any new responsibilities that would reﬂect his adult
status. By contrasting these two rites of passage, Sand challenges the commonly held
belief that, for a young man, sexual experience is an indispensable step toward manhood.
Francois does not need to sow his wild oats, as did Marguerite’s d’Avannes and Balzac’s
Félix de Vandenesse. Rousseau’s sexual rights divorced from adult responsibilities

ultimately proved fatal to the relationship and to his happiness, while Francois’s ability to

107

support himself, manage property, and right injustices enables him to return to a
relationship with Madeleine as an equal partner rather than as a semi-willing victim.12

To demonstrate that he is ready to live up to the standards Madeleine has set,
Francois must leave home. Blanchet’s jealousy provides the impetus for his departure,
which provides another glimpse into the power dynamics of the relationship between
Francois and Madeleine. She refuses to explain to Francois why he must leave and so
draws on her own bases of power to effect his departure, bases of referent and veiled
coercive power that closely resemble those employed by the lady of Pamplona and
Henriette de Mortsauf. She tells him that he is grown up and that leaving home to enter
the wider world is the next natural step. Francois fails to yield to this invocation of
reason, so Madeleine makes it personal, drawing on Francois’s valuing of their
relationship. She tells him, “Si vous n’avez pas non plus de volonté et de soumission
qu’un enfant... vous ne méritez pas l’amitié que j’ai pour vous...” (110). The observation
that he may not deserve her friendship carries with it the threat that it may be withdrawn
and so Francois, who had told her earlier, “si je vous perdais, je n’aurais plus personne
sur la terre”, acquiesces (85).

Separation results in illness, not just for Madeleine, which has been the result of
separation for all the female Pygmalion ﬁgures studied thus far except Mme de Warens,
but also for Francois, a phenomenon seen previously only in Rousseau. Illness functions
very differently in Francois le champi and the Confessions, however. Francois falls ill
for the same reason as the female protagonists in these texts, as a reﬂection of the
emotional pain separation causes. In contrast, Rousseau’s illnesses result not from

geographical distance between him and his Maman, but from a need to open psychic

108

space in a relationship he cannot admit to ﬁnding oppressive. He repeatedly uses poor
health as a means to opt out of sexual relations while reinforcing his role as the recipient
of Mme de Warens’ maternal affection. As their relationship deteriorates and
Wintzenreid appears at les Charmettes, the search for a cure to yet another inexplicable
illness furnishes a legitimate reason for separation that is convenient for both Jean-
Jacques and Maman. Thus, for Rousseau, physical illness does not express grief and
loss, but is a basis of power. Like the Romantic heroes examined in Margaret Waller’s
The Male Malady, Rousseau learns “to take advantage of the ‘powers of the weak’
(silence, withdrawal, and refusal), which are traditionally associated with women, as
underhanded means of reempowerment” (3). In his weakness, Jean-Jacques exercises the
power of legitimate dependence, the only power available to him in this power-
imbalanced relationship.

Whether illness is the cause or the effect of the separation, distance from their
sculptors gives Francois and Jean-Jacques the opportunity to demonstrate the success of
Pygmalion’s project. While Rousseau’s success is limited, Francois’s is complete.” In
the three years he spends in the Aigurande he makes his employer’s farm very successful.
Vertaud is appreciative, recognizing that Francois’s heart is as good as his head and his
hands (129). His respect for him is so great that, despite Francois’s openness about his
status as a champi, he wants him to marry his daughter, a match Jeannette accepts as
well. This marriage offer conﬁrms the success of Madeleine’s project, but disconcerts
Francois, who remains devoted to his adoptive mother.

F rancois’s response to the suggestion of a replacement love object provides

another point of contrast with Rousseau. On his trip to Montpellier, Jean-Jacques has an

109

affair with Mme de Lanarge, a substitute love object and, outside a relationship in which
he is essentially powerless, experiences sexual pleasure for the ﬁrst time. On his return
from Montpellier, Rousseau presents his dilemma at whether to make the visit he had
promised to Mme de Lanarge or to return to Mme de Warens. After much internal
debate, he resolves to return home to Maman, a decision he regards as a triumph of his
own virtue and sense of duty over his impulse to pleasure. Rousseau’s self-depiction as
an active decision maker willing to put Maman’s interests before his own is another
attempt, like his illness, to establish a sense of agency in their relationship. If he can
convince ﬁrst himself and then Maman of his sacriﬁce for her, he enables himself to
exercise the power of legitimate reciprocity. Mme de Warens exercises this power over
him because she has provided for him, but if he can point to his own sacriﬁces made for
her, he will be able to share in this basis of power and take a step closer to the status of
equal partner rather than remaining a charity case.

Sand places Francois in direct opposition to Jean-Jacques. First, Jeannette
Vertaud is an eligible choice of love object. When Rousseau bypasses Mme de Lanarge,
he is giving up a temporary ﬂing with a woman who already has a husband and family,
while Francois, in turning down marriage to Jeannette, sacriﬁces stability as a member of
a respectable family, prosperity in his eventual ownership of the Vertaud property, and
contentment in his relationship with a kind and virtuous woman. While Rousseau fears
the animosity of Mme de Lanarge’s family, Francois is embraced by Jeannette’s father,
who initiates the idea of marriage and persists in it even after Francois tells him about his
champiage. Jeannette, although initially disconcerted by the information, remains

enthusiastic about their possible marriage. By contrast, Rousseau’s true identity is

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another source of concern. Mme de Lanarge knows him as Mr. Dudding, an assumed
persona that would be immediately revealed as a hoax by anyone who had ever been to
England or spoke even a word of English. Thus, fear of embarrassment and family
tension motivates Rousseau’s “sacriﬁce” at least as much as his professed devotion. His
claims of undying faithfulness fall under greater suspicion when we consider evidence
that Rousseau knew that Wintzenreid had replaced him before he left for Montpellier and
that correspondence with Mme de Warens during his absence conﬁrmed that her ties to
Wintzenreid continued '4. Given these considerations, Rousseau’s relinquishment of
Mme de Lanarge pales beside Francois’s refusal of Jeannette Vertaud. Despite the very
real beneﬁts marriage to Jeannette would bring, beneﬁts he acknowledges, Francois
remains devoted to Madeleine. Without knowing if she will ever need him or if he will
ever be able to return, he makes the decision to remain free without a moment’s
hesitation. He tells Vertaud in response to his general question about marriage, “de
femmes... il n’y en a qu’une pour moi et c’est ma mere Madeleine” (135).

Francois’s conversation with Jeannette reinforces the ﬁlial nature of his devotion,
evidenced by his use of “ma mere”. Curious about her rival, she asks Francois how old
Madeleine is and if she is pretty. Francois knows the answer to neither of these
questions, replying “C’était pour moi comme ma mere, et je ne regardais pas a ses ans”
(138). As long as the balance of power between them remains lopsided, Francois and
Madeleine’s feelings for each other must remain those of a devoted son and nurturing
mother or risk violating the incest taboo.ls If Madeleine is to become a legitimate
partner, Francois needs the opportunity to level the playing ﬁeld. This opportunity

presents itself in two stages. The ﬁrst is the shadowy reappearance of Francois’s

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biological mother who contacts him through the village priest. Nicole Mozet notes that
this multiplicity of mother ﬁgures around Francois contributes to preserving the
innocence of his relationship with Madeleine (95). Though Francois has left
Madeleine’s home and is successfully earning an independent living, the monetary gift he
receives from his mother will give him the resources necessary to return Madeleine’s
generosity. So Francois’s mother’s presence lays the groundwork for a leveling of power
between them.

News of Blanchet’s death and the resulting difficulties Madeleine faces allows
Francois to put his resources to use. Madeleine’s Widowhood has the obvious effect of

freeing her to remarry, but this is not an option considered by either at this point. After

 

taking leave of Vertaud and Jeannette, Francois arrives to ﬁnd the mill in bad shape and
Madeleine seriously ill from the effort of caring for her husband. He immediately steps
in to help care for her, nurturing her back to health and beginning to counterbalance
Madeleine’s power of legitimate reciprocity over him that resulted from her taking him in
as a child. She brought him back to consciousness after the shock of la Zabelle’s
rejection and he restores her to health after the trauma of her husband’s death.

With Madeleine on the road to recovery, Francois sets about righting the other
problems the family faces. Like Mme de Warens, Madeleine ﬁnds herself in ﬁnancial
difﬁculty, though her problems are not the result of chronic overspending, but of her
husband’s mismanagement of their resources and la Sévere’s fraud. Unlike Rousseau,
Francois has the skills, resources, and authority to right the situation. He begins by
getting the mill going again, restoring the income it brought to the family. His hard work

and management abilities contrast directly with Rousseau’s inability to manage the

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property at les Charmettes, an inability that led Mme de Warens to take on Wintzenreid.
Francois turns next to Blanchet’s papers, where he discovers la Sévere’s malicious
intentions and formulates a plan to return Madeleine’s land to her. Sand demonstrates

F rancois’s authority ﬁrst by Catherine’s reaction to him — she treats him as if he were
master of the house—and second by Francois’s perception of what he is doing. AS he
plans to restore Madeleine’s property, he tells Catherine, “La poule peut bien essayer de
tirer une plume a l’oiseau méchant qui lui a plume ses poussins” (134). Francois regards
himself as the responsible party, taking the role of the mother hen protecting her chicks,
Madeleine and Jeannie. This role moves beyond perception as Francois implements his
plan, making use of his insight into human nature and the ﬁnancial resources his mother
provided him to restore Madeleine’s property and erase the bogus debts that la Sévere
claimed Blanchet had incurred. Rescuing Madeleine from imminent ﬁnancial ruin
cements F rancois’s power of legitimate equity. In fact, although Francois does not
consider his debt to Madeleine repaid, she insists that she now owes him, and promises to
pay him back.

F rancois’s ability to build his own bases of power creates the potential for their
relationship to move from that of mother and son to wife and husband. Francois does not
need to earn Madeleine’s maternal affection, but by demonstrating his manhood through
the assumption of adult responsibilities, Francois proves himself worthy of a woman’s
love and respect. Rousseau, however, never succeeds in making this transition.
Although he wants to provide for Mme de Warens, to rescue her from her bleak ﬁnancial
situation, he does not have the resources to do so. He exercises no power over her

whatsoever, and so is unable to change her self-destructive Spending habits. He also

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possesses no real marketable skills that would guarantee him an income large enough to
support Maman and cover her ﬁnancial missteps. Jean-Jacques, like Francois, receives
money from his biological mother, or, more precisely, her estate, but rather than actively
employing it to permanently resolve the ﬁnancial difﬁculties Mme de Warens faces, he
submissively lays it at her feet, allowing it to be misspent like her other income.
Although Rousseau claims his desire to meet her needs as the impetus that drove him out
into the world and toward his eventual success, he is unable to assume any adult
responsibilities within the context of their relationship and so never reaches manhood in
Mme de Warens’ eyes.

The question of responsibility for the success or failure of this transition from son

 

to partner necessarily arises as we view Madeleine and Mme de Warens as maternal . I
Pygmalion ﬁgures. Our thesis is that Francois and Jean-Jacques are, to a signiﬁcant
extent, what their sculptors have made them. They must, therefore, take some credit or
bear some blame for the outcome of their projects. Francois succeeds because Madeleine
has given him a valid deﬁnition of manhood. A man is honest, hardworking,
compassionate, charitable, and responsible not only for himself, but for those who depend
on him. More accurately, this deﬁnition is not a gendered one. The author who wrote to
her friend Flaubert that there is only one sex has created an ideal man by giving him a
woman as his role model. The qualities describing Francois above describe Madeleine
with equal accuracy.'6 In attaining the standards she has set, Francois is able to leave
home, earn the respect of his society, and ﬁnally demonstrate his worthiness of
Madeleine’s love. Mme de Warens deﬁnes manhood primarily as sexual activity.

Consequently, Rousseau’s foray into the broader world focuses on his affair with

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Madame de Lanarge. He has no means of rectifying the power imbalance between
Maman and himself and so no hope of establishing a long-term partnership with her. He
has nothing to offer, no means to “suff[ire] a son cmur comme elle suffrsait au mien”
(Tenth promenade).

Rousseau drew criticism from his contemporaries and followers, including
George Sand, for his treatment of Mme de Warens in his Confessions, and the blame for
the disintegration of their relationship nearly always falls on him. Even Jean Guéhenno,
who, of Rousseau’s biographers, provides the harshest portrait of Mme de Warens, .
concludes that she was poorly rewarded for her generosity. However, when we compare

Rousseau’s relationship with Francois’s, its inappropriateness emerges. Between ,5

 

Francois and Madeleine, a sexual relationship is out of the question until Francois has left
her home, established himself independently, and returned to rescue her, consequently
building his own bases of power and enabling him to enter into a marital (i.e. sexual)
relationship with Madeleine as an equal partner. Although their history may still make
readers squeamish despite Sand’s concerted effort to demonstrate the innocence of the
relationship and the distinct passage from ﬁlial and maternal love to passion, the decision
to marry is clearly made by two consenting adults.

Whereas Mme de Warens’ alleged lack of desire mitigates her culpability, Sand
maintains Madeleine’s innocence by compartmentalizing her desire. Sand is emphatic
about the exclusively maternal nature of Madeleine’s love for Francois, as we have seen
in her willingness to kiss him, her slowness to understand the rumors, and her husband’s
embarrassment in confronting her over her relationship with Francois. Sand presents

more testimony in the time that elapses between Francois’s change of heart and

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Madeleine’s. When Francois ﬁrst considers marrying, she cannot see that she is the one
he wants, and persists in trying to match him with Mariette. In response to Francois’s
explanation of the rumors that Mariette and la Se’vére have been circulating about them,
she insists that only the devil would say that she looks at him in any way other than as her
son (227), and upon meeting Jeannette, whom she thinks Francois wants to marry, she is
not the least bit jealous, “car elle n’avait jamais songé a Francois que come a l’enfant
qu’elle aurait mis au monde” (239). She can hardly believe Jeannette’s explanation of
Francois’s feelings, thinking that he merely wishes to continue to serve her, preserving
her reputation and preventing her from feeling the need to repay him the money he used

to restore her property. Her refusal to accept a relationship based on duty reveals Sand’s

 

respect for the importance of passion in love.17 Madeleine wants more for Francois, and
Sand wants more for Madeleine. Unlike Rousseau, who paints Mme de Warens as frigid,
Sand touches Madeleine with a coup defoudre of her own. Desire has a place in
Madeleine and Francois’s relationship, but it cannot be ignited until the balance of power
between them reaches equilibrium. Madeleine’s fears that Francois is marrying her out
of duty may also be fears of losing her own power in the relationship.18 If Francois were
to sacriﬁce his potential happiness to keep her from public scandal, he would exercise
considerable powers of legitimate equity and reciprocity. But his desire reinforces her
referent power, permitting a relationship between equal partners and the expression of her
own passion in return.

Margaret Gray criticizes Sand’s choice to leave Madeleine speechless on the
subject of her desire, viewing Francois le champi as an enactment of the suppression of

“feminine” language (342). Citing Julia Kristeva’s work, Gray discusses the shunning of

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the idea of a mother’s enjoyment of sexual pleasure by both East and West. Married
women are to be childbearers with the function of producing heirs to carry their father’s
name, and are to be neither desiring nor desirable. Gray accuses Sand of propagating this
view, privileging a male perspective in keeping with her masculine pen name. While
excluding the possibility of a mother who desires limits women and denies them full
personhood, Gray does not fully acknowledge that placing the language of desire on
Madeleine’s lips would violate not only the prohibition on desiring mothers, but the
incest taboo. As Mozet points out, Sand mutes Francois’s desire as well by leaving his
words out of direct discourse. The narrator tells us that Francois spoke, but not what he

said (94). One could argue that Francois is capable of verbalizing his feelings not

 

because he is a man and therefore the appropriate originator of desire, but because he has
had time to reﬂect on the transformation of his attachment. Sand would be portraying
Madeleine as tongue-tied not to diminish her agency in the situation, but to underline the
purity of her maternal love for Francois. Their relationship as man and wife can only be
acceptable if the reader believes that Madeleine’s desire is born at the moment of
Francois’s confession, an experience that would understandably leave her unable to
express herself. '9 Diana Holmes agrees, seeing Francois le champi not as an oppressive
silencing of the female protagonist, but as an optimistic tale in which desire triumphs
over repression (33).

Sand is clear that Madeleine does not make Mme de Warens’ mistake, nor
Pygmalion’s, for that matter. She sculpts Francois into a complete man, one she has no
intentions of keeping for herself, and does not initiate a sexual relationship in which her

creation has no choice. In Francois le champi, Venus’s intervention is needed not to

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bring the statue to life, so to speak, but to spark desire in the sculptor.20 The sharp
delineation between Madeleine’s roles of mother and lover save both her and Francois
from the consequences of incest, either in the form of a ﬂawed product or the punishment
of the gods visited on later generations. Instead, her virtue earns her happiness with a
man she has made worthy of her. Robert Godwin-Jones describes Madeleine’s

6

achievements. ‘...she shows her worth by caring for a champi and after educating him
crowns the process by becoming his wife; her spiritual level is so high she earns the right
to marry her own child” (296).

Maternal Pygmalion ﬁgures are the only creators able to emerge from a
relationship with their creations unharmed and without inﬂicting excessive harm. Mme
de Warens’ ultimate fate is dismal, but it results from her spending habits and
susceptibility to con artists rather than from her relationship with Rousseau. The
incestuous nature of their sexual relationship no doubt leaves Rousseau scarred, but when
he reﬂects on their relationship, his memories are characterized overwhelmingly by
gratitude, not blame. Madeleine and Francois go several steps further, achieving the only
happy ending in the texts treated in this analysis. Two factors contribute to the relative
success of these relationships. First, the ultimate goal of these relationships is the young
man’s independence. Both women foresee and work toward the day when they will
relinquish their formative power because their prote'gés have achieved autonomy. Losing
control is not a disaster, as is the case for Madamedes Belles Cousines, but an end.
Second, these relationships are at least as Oedipal as they are Pygmalionesque. The

intensity of feeling in the relationship, romantic love for Francois and an undeﬁnable

burning adoration for Rousseau, originates with the creation rather than the creator.

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Successful resolution of the Oedipal conﬂict requires the presence of a father ﬁgure ﬁrst
to challenge and then with whom to identify. This presence is lacking in both
relationships, which explains the young men’s inability to make a substitute object
choice. Anet might have played the role of father ﬁgure to Rousseau, but Jean-Jacques
was not forced to compete with him. There are no father ﬁgures surrounding Francois.
Blanchet ﬁlls the spot where a father ﬁgure could have been placed, but he embodies

none of the qualities needed to win Madeleine’s love, serving as a negative example

' "“5

rather than as a man to emulate. Consequently, both young men remain attached to their
adoptive mothers. F rancois’s relationship to Madeleine is more successful because she

more effectively leads him to self-reliance. Having established his own bases of power,

 

he can freely choose her over an affair with la Sévere or marriage to either Mariette or
Jeannette. The balance of power between Francois and Madeleine enables them to avoid
the label of incest and to ﬁnd happiness.

These maternal relationships mark the neutral midpoint in the spectrum of
relationships deﬁned by female Pygmalion ﬁgures. Earlier texts describe relationships
that prove disastrous for their creator; those that follow result in the destruction of the

creation.

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Chapter 4

Monsieur Vénus and Chéri: The Creation, Adoration, and Destruction of the Male Object

Female Pygmalion ﬁgures undertake their projects to fulﬁll a need they cannot
otherwise meet. Antoine de la Sale’s Belle Dame des Belles Cousines needed a way to
occupy her time and a serviteur who would not threaten the independence She was
fortunate enough to have won. The lady of Pamplona and Henriette de Mortsauf are too
young and vibrant to be entirely satisﬁed in their marriages to old or sickly men, but too
virtuous to accept the conventional solution of taking a young lover. Mme de Warens

and Madeleine Blanchet adopt sons as an outlet for their nurturing generosity. By the end

 

of the nineteenth century, however, the female Pygmalion’s needs have become more

.§?__ -

frankly sexual, and acknowledged as such from the beginning. Rachilde’s Raoule de
Vénérande and Colette’s Léa de Lonval approach their projects with a shared openness to
and about the sensuality of their relationships. In fact, pleasure patently motivates these
relationships in the ﬁrst place. Both women are sexually experienced, with little concern
about either their reputations or the fate of their immortal souls. Both are drawn to
beautiful yet wildly inappropriate young men, and neither hesitates in her decision to take
advantage of the opportunity before her. Raoule and Lea each bend traditional gender
roles in playing the “sugar daddy” to her kept man while shaping him into the kind of
lover she thinks she wants. The form he takes depends upon the threat each woman
faces. Raoule de Vénérande, as a young aristocratic woman of marrying age, feels the
pressure to choose a husband. A change in marital status would be a greater change than
she could accept. Orphaned in infancy, raised by her maiden aunt, and independently

wealthy, Raoule has escaped many of the pressures of patriarchal society and has no

120

intention of submitting to them now. Jacques Silvert, nominally younger and vastly
weaker due to his poverty and lowly social standing, offers ﬁrst an escape and then a
solution to the conundrum of autonomy in marriage.

Colette’s Léa faces a very different and more inevitable threat: old age and the
loss of the beauty and sensuality that has in many ways deﬁned her life up to this, her
forty-ninth year. For her, independence is not an issue. She lives in a society of women,
where men ﬁgure only in passing as brief diversions who may provide pleasure, but more
importantly, income. As Le’a nears the end of a successful career as a courtesan, she
ﬁnds herself wealthy and unattached as she faces a transition to a new way of life. She
sees clearly the inevitability of her aging as she looks at the women around her, former
beauties now putting on weight, hunching over in age, or sprouting facial hair. Le'a
reserves a particular distaste for Lili, who does not acknowledge her age and
unattractiveness, persisting in chasing very young men. However, Le'a is still younger
than these women and is not ready give up the ﬁght for her beauty, especially not at the
outset of her relationship with Chéri, six years before the opening scene of the novel.
What Le’a needs from this relationship is not a weak creature to be dominated, but a
mirror that reﬂects back to her the image of a woman who is still beautiful and desirable.
The exceptional beauty and desirability of the mirror itself heightens its value.

These two texts, which on the surface share many characteristics, provide
additional perspectives from which to view the workings of social power. The different
needs of the two sculptors not only aim at different ends, but also require different means.
To use inappropriate bases of power in these cases would be to render the outcomes of

their projects meaningless.

121

Raoule de Vénérande’s driving force in life is a desire to preserve her
independence, not just from the bonds patriarchal society would impose on her but from
convention of any kind. She prides herself on her singularity, a pride that brings her to
Marie Silvert in the ﬁrst place with an idea for a ball costume that cannot be entirely
executed by her couturier, but requires the assistance of a Specialist. She smokes, fences,
ignores religion, and refuses marriage, embodying the Special privileges of elite
individuals whose superiority enables them to step beyond the boundaries society
normally imposes (Holmes 76). Like Pygmalion, Raoule has found the choice of
available love objects unsatisfactory. She seeks a relationship in which She can

accomplish two goals. First, she must retain her autonomy. This is a principle on which

 

she will not compromise. Second, she wants to experience passion and pleasure, but she
sees no way to accomplish this goal without sacriﬁcing the ﬁrst as long as she must play
the female role. When she meets Jacques, she sees in him the potential for the partner
she needs, one who can play both parts and mirror her own gender ﬂexibility. Because
she requires Jacques’s total submission in order to make him a pliable partner, she will
wield an impressive array of bases of social power, the most diverse since Madamedes
Belles Cousines.

This creation story begins by invoking the Western original where Jacques plays
the role of the forbidden fruit in a Decadent Eden characterized by the splendid
artiﬁciality prized in the Decadent aesthetic. Rachilde’s description of the red-gold hair
covering Jacques’s rounded body equates him with the apples cooking on the stove, a
representation of an intense, contradictory passion that takes Raoule from disgust to

desire (Kingcaid 122,3). Jacques Silvert appears as a gateway to knowledge she does not

122

 

possess, knowledge not of good and evil, but of passion. But like the apples, Jacques
will not be enjoyed in his natural state, but must be transformed from one state to another.
As raw material, Jacques has nothing to offer but his beauty. He is neither intelligent, nor
witty, nor artistically gifted. His skill is limited to his craftsmanship, another mark of his
class: his hands are competent, but he lacks the inspiration, vision, and creativity of the
artist. He is also surprisingly innocent, given his family background: an alcoholic father,
an unfaithful mother, and a prostitute sister. Even in his immense poverty, Jacques has
refused Marie’s suggestions that he turn his appearance to his advantage, and has scraped r
by doing odd jobs. Raoule ﬁnds this temptation, hidden in a Paradise of artiﬁcial roses,

wallﬂowers, and violets strewn over dirty plates and empty bottles, irresistible. And in

 

the corner, under a pile of paper lilies, Marie Silvert watches and waits, ready to play the
role of the serpent. However, the dialog between Eve and her tempter is entirely internal.
External temptation requires the acknowledgment of another’s power, which Raoule’s
independence will not permit. She is also not strongly inclined to resist. Any commands
of “Thou shalt not” handed down in her earlier education have long been ignored, leaving
her no real reason to resist this temptation not just to pleasure, but to singularity as well.
And so the stage is set for the story of another Fall, not from Paradise, for Jacques begins
this story living in poverty and squalor, but from innocence.

At this ﬁrst meeting, Raoule de Vénérande wields an impressive degree of
legitimate position power over Jacques Silvert. She is the wealthy client; he is not even
the poor craftsman, but her substitute. His role is to ask, “Madame désire?” and then do
whatever he can to satisfy her. The gap between them is so great that Raoule is initially

disgusted and uneasy. However, her admiration of his talent for creating artiﬁcial

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ﬂowers elevates him just enough to make him worthy of an appraisal. This examination
reveals more position power at Raoule’s disposal. The “expression béte” of his eyes and
his gaze akin to that of a begging dog afﬁrm that she holds the power even as his physical
beauty entrances her. The ﬂash of her diamond and her gloved hand on his bare chest
serve as additional reminders of Raoule’s social position and the power it grants her. She
also gives Jacques a taste of the beneﬁts of satisfying her by paying him double what he
asks for the work she has commissioned. Given the extreme poverty in which he lives,
reward power proves an effective corollary to her already overwhelming power of
legitimate position. Jacques has no means of refusing Raoule’s demands on the basis of
this power alone, but reward power puts a velvet glove on her iron ﬁst.

Raoule does fall under Jacques’s power, but it is not one he consciously exercises.
He can control the effect of his beauty no more than the water lilies he is sketching for
Raoule’s costume can control their aphrodisiacal scent. We know already that Jacques
lacks artistic talent, wit, family name, manners, and common sense. Rather than
endowing him with a measure of agency, his seductive power ﬁrrther accentuates
Jacques’s status as an object to be used at will. Linda Klieger Stillman sees in this
depiction of Jacques a gender-reversed parody of the portrayal of women as having only
sexual signiﬁcance (210). The ﬁrst time Raoule fantasizes about Jacques, She evokes
“un bel instrument de plaisir qu’elle convoitait” and that she holds in her arms already in
her imagination (19). Raoule does not content herself with fantasies, however. She has a
plan for “l’enveloppe, l’épiderme, l’étre palpable, 1e male” that She has stumbled upon, a
plan that seems to have been germinating for quite some time. Now that she has found a

suitable piece of ivory, she has only to sculpt it to her speciﬁcations.

124

 

Raoule begins by placing Jacques in an environment, both physical and social,
that traditionally belongs to women, an environment similar to those surrounding
Hercules, dressed in long women’s robes and spinning linen thread at Omphale’s feet,
and Achilles, disguised as one of Lycomedes’s daughters in his court. The ﬁrst steps in
Raoule’s plan reveal a catalog of topoi of femininity. The luxurious apartment detaches
him from his former life, removes him from his work and acquaintances, and erases his
daily concerns for meeting his basic survival needs. By enclosing him and eliminating
the need for his activity, Raoule begins Jacques’s shift toward a more female gender role
in which he will be conﬁned to the domestic sphere, remaining stationary while Raoule

moves freely in society. His gilded cage, in all its luxury, not only contains Jacques, but

 

also reinforces Raoule’s reward power and builds her power of legitimate reciprocity.
She has rescued him from his squalid dormer and promises to nurture his artistic talent
and offer him a comfortable life, which Jacques accepts without recognizing what he will
owe her in return. He insists, “Mademoiselle de Vénérande est une artiste voila tout!
Elle a pitié des artistes; elle est bonne, elle est juste...” (31).

Raoule’s ﬁrst visit to Jacques’s new apartment underlines the position of
weakness in which Raoule places Jacques, the position patriarchal society assigns to
women. Jacques is lolling about on the furniture, “fou d’une folie de ﬁancée en présence
de son trousseau de femme” when Raoule enters (34). She exerts power immediately:
legitimate position power as the mistress of the house; legitimate reciprocity as Jacques’s
benefactress; expert power as a respectable artist herself and a year older than he; and
coercive power, blatantly exercised in her “j’ai envie de vous étrangler.” Her power is

visually represented in her black sheath dress, “presque masculin” and her lion-clawed

125

 

“chevaliére”, a term that evokes an image of military prowess in feminine form while it
describes her Signet ring. Linguistically, the power imbalance appears in Raoule’s heavy
use of the imperative: “Répondez”, “venez”, Enfermez-vous”. Raoule’s carnivalesque
rearrangement of the disorder Jacques has created with the furnishings of the apartment
further suggests the inversion of roles that is beginning.

AS Raoule directs him to bathe, Jacques is the object of her gaze, playing the role
of the innocent country girl who comes to the city only to be despoiled by a predatory
urbanite. Even his body blurs gender lines. Rachilde begins her description by placing

him in another female role, that of a courtesan, emphasizing the voluptuous roundness

and softness of his body. But she steps short of feminizing him completely, admiring the

 

golden curls that cover his entire body and making a euphemistic reference to his other
distinguishing male feature. This is exactly Raoule’s goal for him, a lover with many
feminine attributes, but who maintains a measure of masculinity.

Jacques’s physical beauty is so great that Raoule nearly loses her nerve, fearing
that she will not be able to maintain control over him or over herself. But when faced
with the alternative of a conventional male-female relationship, she returns, marches into
Jacques’s apartment in a confrontational mood and ﬁnds exactly what She seeks: a
passive, cowering child who hides his face in his pillow. This confounding of the
feminine with the infantile is yet another nineteenth-century commonplace of femininity.
Raoule ﬁnds his weakness intoxicating, and relaunches her project of a genderless lover
immediately. Marie has inadvertently helped her in the process by dressing Jacques in a
woman’s nightgown. Jacques’s laughter at his predicament overcomes her last

reservations and she abandons herself to her task.

126

She outlines her plan for her gender-reversed relationship in a conversation with
de Raittolbe, forcing him out of his role as would-be lover and into the position of
conﬁdante. She begins by telling him that she is amoureux, and that she will be
Jacques’s lover (son amant) rather than his mistress, loving Jacques with the intensity and
hopelessness with which a ﬁance loves his dead ﬁancee, an ominous foreshadowing of
the ending. When de Raittolbe insists that she settle on a consistent pronoun to refer to
Jacques, She chooses the feminine, and reveals her intentions to support him. After de
Raittolbe leaves, she visits her aunt who is praying to the Virgin Mary, “Souvenez—vous,
6 tres douce Vierge Marie, qu’on n’a jamais entendu qu’aucun de ceux qui ont eu recours
a vous aient été délaisse’s” (78), and wonders to herself whether anyone has ever asked
the Virgin Mother for a sex change.

However, Raoule’s true intention is not to become a man. The justiﬁcation for
her project lies in her perceived right to sexual satisfaction as a woman, “l’élite (les
femmes de notre époque” (72). She is spurred to action in both her own interests, and on
behalf of her metaphorical sisters.l Men have failed women of her class by meeting only
their own needs for pleasure and procreation, rather than concerning themselves with
making their partners happy. This new vice She is pioneering, justiﬁed in her eyes
because she is its innovator, will bring her a man with a woman’s sensibilities, liberating
Raoule and her sisters from the inferior role imposed on them by their sex. Antiquity’s
celebrated passions based on sex divorced from procreation live again in a new form.
“Elle inventera des caresses, trouvera de nouvelles preuves aux nouveaux transports d’un

nouvel amour et Raoule de Vénérande possédera Jacques Silvert...”(94).

127

Although Jacques’s gender ambiguity initially inspires Raoule’s project, She still
has work to do. She has already placed him in a traditionally female role: her mistress, a
kept woman who is the object of her gaze and her desire. But to be truly transformed,
Jacques must embrace the part Raoule has assigned him. When she returns to the
apartment after her earlier ﬂight, she makes it clear that she is now fully committed to her
undertaking. She silences him with her “Tais-toi. Je ne viens pas ici pour t’entendre”, an
objectiﬁcation that emphasizes his feminization. In drugging him for their ﬁrst sexual
encounter, a scene laden with maternal imagery as Raoule Spoonfeeds Jacques a dose of
hashish, She separates him from any expectations about what sex Should be, instilling
artiﬁcially the ﬂexibility toward which she is working. Maryline Lukacher sees in this
overbearing motherhood a maternity that is reinvested with patriarchal attributes, another
blurring of what is normally a Sharply deﬁned gender role (111). In his hallucinatory
state, Jacques hears “les chants d’un amour étrange n’ayant pas de sexe et procurant
toutes les voluptés” (62).

Raoule encourages and develops Jacques’s femininity with a blend of coercive
and reward power that would make B.F. Skinner proud. The turning point in their
relationship begins when Raoule takes de Raittolbe to visit Jacques. The experience
humiliates Jacques as he is put on display for Raoule’s friend, whose masculinity and
aristocratic status put Jacques’s deﬁcits in these areas in relief. As de Raittolbe leaves, he
reminds Raoule of their plans for the evening, emphasizing the life the two of them have
outside the apartment, a life in which Jacques does not participate. But the humiliation
does not end when de Raittolbe leaves. Raoule turns on him, ﬁrst criticizing his paintings

as reminiscent of his former job, and then screaming at him for smoking and talking to

128

men without her permission. Jacques is speechless as She forces him to the ﬂoor and
roars, “Je suisjaloux!” (84). This is the ﬁrst time She reveals explicitly the masculine
nature of her feelings for him and‘his expected feminine response. She says, as she
senses She is hurting him, “Tu dois t’apercevoir.... que je n’ai pas, comme toi, des mains
de ﬂeuriste et que, de nous deux, le plus homme c’est toujours moi?” (85).

But her jealousy overcomes her and She breaks down sobbing, giving Jacques an
opportunity to reply. He comforts her, extracts a profession of love from her, expresses
his own jealousy at seeing her with another man, and complains at her treatment of him.
In Short, he reasserts his own masculinity. Raoule responds with an assertion of her
powers of seduction, powers that do not shift her back to her masculine role. She kisses
his head to bow it, then bites the nape of his neck, bringing Jacques enormous pleasure.
She goes on to replace her coercive and reward powers with ﬂattery, emphasizing the
absolute power of beauty. Emboldened by his resulting arousal, Jacques expresses his

‘6

desire: ...tu m’as prouvé, en effet, que je n’avais pas a rougir devant toi. Raoule, le lit
bleu nous attend, viens!” (88).

Until this moment, power has Shifted back and forth between them without
resistance on the part of the one relinquishing it, but now the real struggle begins.
Jacques is behaving like every other man she has been with in this Situation. When
Raoule tells him he will not be her lover, but her Slave, he responds playfully, trying to
pull her with him into the bedroom, but her insistence that he acknowledge her power
evaporates his conﬁdence. He threatens to leave; She tells him he cannot because they

love each other. The gender roles they have been playing, those assigned them by

biology, are turned back on their heads for a moment as Jacques turns to pout and Raoule,

129

 

 

 

apologetic, murmurs, “Pardon!.. moi, j’oubliais que tu es une petite femme capricieuse
qui ale droit, chez elle, de me torturer” (89). She agrees to do as he wishes, apparently
returning to her female role. But she is not the same woman. She undresses herself,
pulling the curtain to prevent Jacques from seeing her, and slips into bed, cold as a
marble statue. Jacques tries to retain his masculinity, asking, “Raoule, ne m’appelle plus
femme cela m’humilie...” (90). But she is unresponsive, just as she is to the pleading for
a response that follows, pleading she is all too familiar with. “Elle connaissait ce jeu-la,
elle savait, mot a mot, ce que la nature dirait par la voix de Jacques...”(91). In
desperation, he begs, “F ais de moi ce que tu voudras a présent...” (91). By exacting these
words, Raoule has won the decisive battle. Stillman notes that although their roles are
reversed, the dynamic of domination and negation permeates them yet (209). Raoule’s
wealth and social position grant her superiority over Jacques in many ways, but in order
to create the lover she wants, She needs him to give up the power granted him by his
gender. His acquiescence invests Raoule with this power and transforms her from marble
statue to a living, desiring woman, a reward for his submission. In this momentary echo
of the original Pygmalion myth, Raoule plays both Galatea and Venus, but in his cry of
desperation, Pygmalion hands the goddess his tools. “Jacques Silvert, lui cédant sa
puissance d’homme amoureux, devint sa chose, une sorte d’étre inerte qui se laissait
aimer parce qu’il aimait lui-meme d’une facon impuissante” (94).

Once Raoule has appropriated Jacques’s power, she has only to ﬁne-tune him to
her liking, a shaping she accomplishes gradually. She keeps Jacques enclosed in the
apartment, pushing him into “l’existence oisive des orientales murées dans leur Sérail”,

keeping him in a passive happiness “comme une perle dans sa nacre” (95). She sends

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him ﬂowers accompanied by a note emphasizing the playfulness of their role reversal
“pour ne pas trop effrayer 1e male qu’elle désirait étouffer en lui” (96). She takes him
out to the Bois de Boulogne, where he plays his feminine role to perfection, leaning his
head on her shoulder, making silly statements that heighten his appeal, as do his fears that
she will marry and leave him. The thought they share, “la destruction de leur sexe”
demonstrates the growing success of her project (98).

She reinforces Jacques’s femininity by beginning to visit cross-dressed, a move
that emphasizes the performance value of gender roles (Holmes 164). Although startled
by her ﬁrst appearance in man’s clothing, Jacques quickly accepts the intensiﬁed role-
play, greeting Raoule like a worried wife when she appears at his door after a noisy
confrontation in the street with Marie. When Raoule tells him Marie propositioned her,
Jacques reacts in a manner that demonstrates his development: “Pareille idée eﬁt amusé le
ﬂeuriste, trois mois plutot, ce soir-la elle l’indigna...”(104). This version of events is not
quite true. Marie actually propositioned de Raittolbe, but Raoule Spins the story to
emphasize her masculinity, thus encouraging Jacques’s complementary reaction. In
response to Raoule’s observation that she passes for a man, Jacques says, “Pourtant il
te manquera toujours quelque chose!” That this statement is accompanied by a Sigh
rather than laughter demonstrates the extent to which he has been feminized. The game
of trading genders is becoming a real desire for a man, the ﬁrst warning sign that Raoule
has pushed Jacques too far. He confesses in response to Raoule’s observation that she has
never seen him so pretty, “j’ai résolu de te paraitre agacantel”, using the feminine

adjective to refer to himself for the ﬁrst time (105).

131

 

 

Raoule’s delight evaporates quickly when Marie appears, ranting about the
disgusting nature of Raoule and Jacques’s “sales amours”. Each of their responses to her
underlines the gender reversal that is now complete. Raoule prepares to ﬁght, searching
for the dagger in her pocket, while Jacques pales and retreats to his bedroom. De
Raittolbe’s intervention prevents physical violence, but the conﬁontation forces Raoule
to view her relationship with Jacques from another perspective, one in which she sees
some truth. AS she reﬂects on Marie’s outburst, she recognizes another form of female
solidarity, one she would rather deny. “11 y a une chaine rivée entre toutes les femmes
qui aiment... L’honnéte épouse, au moment on elle se livre a son honnéte époux, est dans
la meme position que la prostituée au moment on elle se livre a son amant....” (108). She
considers leaving the entire situation behind her, but practical considerations raised by
her aunt prevent her from doing so, and the hope she still holds for Jacques and the new
kind of love they will share prevails.

Raoule tells Jacques his sister was right about him and that he needs to reclaim his
dignity as a man by returning to his garret and earning an honest living, an effort that will
be rewarded by marriage. She explains, “... je t’ai perdu, je te réhabilite. Quoi de plus
simple! Notre amour n’est qu’une dégradante torture que tu subis parce que je te paye.
Eh bien, je te rends ta liberté” (112). Jennifer Waelti-Walters proposes three levels to
the story of Jacques and Raoule. The ﬁrst is the story of a masculine woman who uses
her wealth and power to feminize a weak man. The second level criticizes the abuse of
women that takes place in the name of love as a result of male passion for beauty and
voluptuousness. The third is an attempt to understand the other by becoming that other in

the love relationship. Waelti-Walters argues that once the roles have been explored,

132

Raoule steps back, beginning Jacques’s education as a gentleman after their engagement
(160-162). Raoule’s offer of rehabilitation can be seen as a ﬁrst instance of this third
level of the story. But Jacques’s response demonstrates Raoule’s success at feminizing
him. He explains his refusal: “Parce que je vous aime, comme vous m’avez appris a vous
aimer...Je retournerai dans une mansarde, Si vous l’exigez, je redeviendrai pauvre, je
travaillerai, mais quand vous voudrez de moi, je serai encore votre esclave, celui que
vous appelez ma femme!” (112,3). Her response echoes Madamedes Belles Cousines’s,
“Vous étes tel que je veuil” with her “tu es meilleur que je ne pouvais 1e supposer” (113).
Raoule de Vénérande has reached her goal of a lover who submits completely to her,
allowing her not only to maintain control of her own actions and decisions, but to deﬁne
her partner’s very identity. Her earlier reﬂection has been realized. “Raoule 1e
contempla pendant une minute se demandant avec une sorte de terreur superstitieuse si
elle n’avait pas créé, apres Dieu, un étre a son image” (99).

The masculine role of lover and the godlike role of creator are both functions
Raoule has usurped, placing her in a position of great power, but leaving her extremely
sensitive to any vulnerability. Raoule has maintained her dominance through a series of
moves designed to crush the claims to power of those around her. Her assumption of a
man’s role and her refusal to play the woman’s place her at odds with society in general,
but de Raittolbe, Marie, and Jacques personify the threats to her independence. Each
time she senses the possibility of any of these people building a basis of power from
which they might be able to exert inﬂuence over her, She reacts, modifying her own

actions in order to remove the potential of falling under another’s sway.

133

De Raittolbe, in his desire to be either her husband or her lover, has the potential
to build bases of referent and legitimate position power. As her friend, de Raittolbe

exercises a degree of referent power, but the referent power She exercises over him is

 

greater, as evidenced by the number of times She successfully inﬂuences his behavior.
She gets him to play the role of her conﬁdante when he wants to be her lover, she
convinces him to come to Jacques’s apartment to see him, and to introduce Jacques to his

architect friend in order to validate JacqueS’s invitation to a ball at her home, all against

‘et

his directly expressed will. He involves himself with Marie, remaining in a Situation he
would rather avoid in order to protect Raoule’s reputation. Ultimately, she uses de
Raittolbe to kill Jacques, an act he would never commit on his own. However, if she
were to take him as her husband or even as her lover, the balance of power, now tipped in
her favor, would be upset.

Raoule’s view of what is at stake in a traditional sexual relationship between a
man and a woman is illustrated early in the novel. When Jacques’s supernatural beauty
and tearful innocence threaten her resolve to mold him into her ideal lover, she reacts by

accepting de Raittolbe. She arranges to meet him the next day at a hotel, and in the

 

carriage on her way to meet him, she reﬂects on her decision. “Certes, il en serait ainsi,
elle se l’était juré et puisqu’il se trouvait, au demeurant, mieux que les autres, i1
l’amuserait peut-étre davantage. Une erreur des sens n’est pas l’e’panouissement d’une
ame, et la beaute' d’une forme hurnaine n’est pas capable d’inspirer le désir de S’attacher a
elle par une éternité de folie” (55, 56). The use of feminine nouns (beauté, forme) to
refer to the object of desire She is rejecting recalls the masculine role she played with

him, a role that contrasts sharply with the one she is playing now. She has traded her

134

 

Rachilde ensures that we recognize this incarnation of her protagonist as a part to be
acted by italicizing its title: “... elle se sentaitfemme jusqu’au plaisir” (56)2. Her pleasure
is short-lived, however. When She arrives at the hotel, she cannot follow through with
either her decision to accept de Raittolbe or to give up Jacques. “Durant tout le chemin,

elle n’y avait pas songé et une fois en pre’sence du sacriﬁce, 1e corps, qui ne s’appartenait

 

black sheath for buttoned gloves and lacy frills, taking pleasure in playing a woman.
plus, venait de se révolter. Raoule avait ce’dé sans aucune contestation” (56). Playing the
.r‘

woman, especially in a sexual relationship, constitutes surrender. This refusal aligns

.——-—-‘.

Raoule with Rachilde’s other heroines. “Dans les romans de Rachilde, la femme libre

refuse a l’homme ce a quoi i1 s’attend et lui montre qu’elle n’a pas toujours la volonte’

 

Fm

d’accepter son don” (Stillman 216). To grant de Raittolbe the title of her lover would be
to acknowledge a greater degree of his referent power and to endow him with legitimate

position power as well, that of any man over a woman in a gender-based relationship.

 

The sacriﬁces de Raittolbe makes to protect Raoule Should grant him powers of
both legitimate equity and legitimate reciprocity, the former due to his involvement in a
situation he ﬁnds distasteful, particularly in his dealings with Marie, and the latter for his
faithful friendship in a wide variety of situations. His reasons for choosing not to
exercise them are not entirely clear, but the outcome of any such attempt may be
predicted by the results of Raoule’s interactions with Marie when Jacques’s sister
attempts to exercise power.

Marie Silvert threatens Raoule’s autonomy as well, primarily through the
attempted proxy exercise of Jacques’s power and the threat of coercive power. Frustrated

with Jacques’s passivity and lack of manipulative Skill, Marie appears at the hotel de

135

Vénérande with a sad story about Jacques’s despair at Raoule’s departure, expecting
Raoule to come running back to Jacques, bringing her wealth with her. Marie’s use of
guilt as she describes Jacques’s suicidal depression amounts to an attempt to use the
bases of power she supposes Jacques should be able to exert: referent and legitimate
dependence. However, Marie quickly discovers that an agent cannot exercise power if
the target will not recognize its basis. Raoule throws money at Marie, and, with the
promise of a little more, has her thrown out, effectively ending her obligation to her and
her brother. Marie’s attempt at inﬂuence provokes a reaction, however, a link made clear
by the temporal proximity of the events that follow. Raoule realizes how close She has
come to entangling herself in a potentially embarrassing, distasteful situation and
responds decisively. The baron de Raittolbe, who has been stymied “pour la milliéme
fois”, suddenly ﬁnds his offer to be either Raoule’s husband or her lover accepted. Of
course, she never follows through on her consent, returning to Jacques and entangling
herself deeply in the emotional morass she had temporarily thought to avoid.

Raoule’s return to her wildly unconventional relationship with Jacques provides
Marie a basis of coercive power. Marie’s disgust at their relationship carries with it the
thinly veiled threat of public disclosure. De Raittolbe advises Raoule not to throw Marie
out for fear that she will give details to all of Parisian society about Raoule’s relationship
with Jacques. Rather than allowing Marie to hold long-term inﬂuence over her behavior,
Raoule moves to destroy her basis of power. She does not want to end her relationship
with Jacques, so she legitimizes it. She ﬁrst brings Jacques into her world by having him
to her aunt’s ball as one of the young artists the de Vénérandes traditionally invite, then

quickly follows this introduction to her society with an engagement announcement.

136

 

 

 

Raoule no longer has so many secrets to keep, so the threat of revealing them loses much
of its coercive power. Marie is paid off, whether by Raoule or de Raittolbe, and not
heard from again until she sends a note alerting Raoule to her husband’s intentions of
inﬁdelity.

Marie’s and de Raittolbe’s bases of power are fairly easily ignored or eroded. But
the ﬁgure that poses the most serious threat to its creator is the creation itself. Raoule
adopts Jacques as her partner in the new kind of love she is pioneering for two principal
reasons. First, his beauty is nearly irresistible. Raoule ﬁrst falls under its Spell during her
visit to the ﬂorist, overcoming it only by leaving the garret and getting fresh air. When
she plays the role of voyeur as Jacques bathes, his perfection once again draws her under
its power, which she examines in a series of contrasts. “Il est beau, j’ai peur. Il est
indifferent, je frissonne. Il est méprisable, je l’admire!...Je l’ai acheté, je lui appartiens.
C’est moi qui suis vendue... J’ai ri du coup de foudre et je suis foudroyée... Et depuis
quand Raoule de Vénérande, qu’une orgie laisse froide, se sent-elle bouillir 1e crane
devant un homme faible comme une jeune ﬁlle?” (41). His power acknowledged, She
quickly rejects it. “Qu’il m’ait dégoﬁtée, avant de m’avoir plu! Qu’il le soit ce qu’ont
éte’ les autres, un instrument que je puisse briser avant de devenir l’écho de ses
vibrations!” (42). We see again the pattern of sensing the potential power of another
followed by dramatic measures to destroy it. This resolution reveals not only her
intentions with Jacques, but also her perception of the danger of becoming involved with
a man. Her fear of losing her individuality and becoming merely a reﬂection of the other
keep her resolutely independent. Her ﬁrst impulse is to control and then crush him, but

when his tears force her to question her ability to do so, she runs.

137

When she returns, she thinks to ensure her safety in the relationship by working to
remove the element of gender. By stripping Jacques of his masculinity, she checks the
legitimate position power it grants him. But Raoule is careful to cap Jacques’s referent
power as well, especially in the early stages of their relationship where his gender
remains a threat. After their ﬁrst sexual encounter, Jacques makes the mistake of
expecting greater familiarity, using “tu” to address Raoule, familiarity she has permitted
herself from the moment she refused his seductive power as she gazed at him in the
bathtub, changing instantly from bewitched victim to dominatrix with her
confrontational, “Enfant, sais-tu que tu es merveilleux?” (42). To maintain this control,
however, she has to keep her distance. Thus, she forbids Jacques the use of “tu”,
reinforcing her denial that their sexual encounter was anything more than a drug-induced
dream. When Jacques throws himself into her arms, she pushes him away, leaves the
bedroom, and deposits a pile of gold coins at his place setting on her way out of the
apartment. This rejection of intimacy thwarts Jacques’s acquisition of any referent
power. Her vision for an ungendered relationship does not include equality, but an
exaggerated reversal of roles in which the physiological man cedes power to the
psychologically masculine woman.

Their next meeting is the climactic one in which Jacques ultimately cedes his
power as a man to Raoule. But earlier in the encounter, Jacques seems to gain a foothold
in the relationship as he exacts promises of love from Raoule, gaining enough conﬁdence
to initiate their lovemaking. At the last minute, however, Raoule rips it away. She senses
Jacques’s developing referent power and his return to the legitimate power with which

his gender invests him, and in response, just as she did when watching him bathe,

138

 

 

 

transforms herself from distraught and jealous lover to absolute master. As we have seen,
the outcome of this incident is Jacques’s total relinquishing of any masculine bases of
power.

As Jacques’s feminization progresses, however, he begins to develop new bases
of power. Raoule was right to think that she had overcorrected, an intuition that leads to
her offer to rehabilitate Jacques and then marry him. Her delight at his complete
submission distracted her temporarily, but his developing feminine desires coupled with
his androgynous seductive appeal combine to create a new threat to Raoule’s control.
Her fears of losing her absolute power over Jacques are the real motivation behind
Raoule’s attempts to re-masculinize Jacques. Waelti-Walters’s suggestion that Raoule
engineers their role reversal to promote greater understanding of the other is not in
keeping with Raoule’s desire for power, inclination to violence, and sense of superiority.
She ﬁrst acts on her suspicions of Jacques’s over-feminization when she beats him
herself in the aftermath of de Raittolbe’s attack. She perceives Jacques’s beauty as a
source of irresistible referent power over her and anyone who approaches him. She
surrnises that de Raittolbe beat Jacques to ﬁght off his attraction and holds Jacques
responsible for his seductiveness. By destroying his beauty, she thinks to undermine his
referent power and keep him under her control.

Raoule’s wedding plans follow soon after her violent attack. Marriage to Jacques
offers a solution to many threats Raoule is facing. First, he frees her from the obligation
to marry someone else whose idea of a wife’s role would be much more traditional.
Second, the legitimization of their relationship erodes Marie’s basis of coercive power.

Finally, by taking Jacques as her “wife”, she legalizes Jacques’s commitment to her and

139

grants herself the legitimate position power to forbid his inﬁdelity and to defend his
honor against would-be lovers.

Their wedding night reveals more fully the threat Jacques now poses in his overly
feminized state. His absence from the banquet forces Raoule to play the role of the
groom, drawing the attention of their guests, who have already commented on Raoule’s
excessive masculinity both in her behavior and in her appearance due to her short hair.
But the delicate balance of gender ambiguity is irrevocably upset in their wedding
chamber. Raoule appears in cross-dress, which is nothing new, and Jacques asks her to
seduce him as a nobleman would his bride. But when, after an hour of lovemaking, she

opens her shirt, Jacques cries out, “Non! non! n’ote pas cet habit”, clear evidence that

 

they have gone too far. “Une seule fois ils avaient joue’ sincerement la comédie tous les II-
deux, ils avaient péche’ contre leur amour, qui pour vivre avait besoin de regarder la vérité
en face, tout en la combattant par sa propre force” (185). Dorothy Kelly clariﬁes the
nature of the sin in her explanation of the function of their relationship. “The two
members of the couple reﬂect each other in a reversed mirror image and permit a
paradoxical narcissistic object love” (147). With Jacques’s total loss of masculinity, he
loses the ability to reﬂect Raoule completely because he can no longer provide the
complement to the feminine traits she retains.

This overcorrection may be part of the reason Raoule restores her relationship
with de Raittolbe. While their marriage offers her a new level of security—she tells
Jacques, “Tu sais que je n’en ai plus peur” (187)—She also sees the need to push Jacques
back a bit from the extremely feminine role he has adopted. Renewing their relationship

with de Raittolbe provides Jacques with a role model. Raoule, secure in their legalized

140

relationship and aware of Jacques’s need to reclaim some of his masculinity, allows
Jacques to spend time alone with de Raittolbe, who teaches him to ride, resumes his
fencing lessons, and goes out with him. This freedom is a major departure from the
insulated, stationary existence Jacques led as Raoule’s mistress and inspires de Raittolbe
to plan some reforms of his own, not just for Jacques, but for Raoule as well. Looking at
Jacques as an equal, seated on a horse with a cigar in the corner of his mouth, de
Raittolbe thinks, “-- Peut—étre tirerait-on un homme de cet argile... Si Raoule voulait. Et il
songeait a une rehabilitation possible, provoquée, en une minute d’oubli, par une vraie
maitresse que Raoule serait force'e de combattre avec la tactique feminine habituelle”

(189). On the way back home, Jacques wants to stop at de Raittolbe’s apartment, where

 

he discloses that his and Raoule’s gender reversals persist despite appearances. As a a;
remedy, de Raittolbe suggests a visit to Marie’s, which Jacques initially refuses,
attempting instead a seduction of de Raittolbe, whom, the narrator explains, he has
confused with Raoule. In the face of de Raittolbe’s angry response, Jacques ﬁrst laughs,
then takes his arm and leads them to their horses and back to the hotel de Vénérande for
dinner, where Raoule never suspects what has passed between them, adding
dissimulation to the list of female attributes Jacques has acquired.

A few nights later, it appears that de Raittolbe has succeeded in Jacques’s
reformation. Raoule, referred to as Mme Silvert, a marked choice of title that emphasizes
the temporary reorientation to traditional gender roles, sits alone in their “temple azuré”
waiting for Jacques, ﬁrst doubting that he has betrayed her, but then putting a dagger to
her heart. But Jacques returns, revealing that Raittolbe has not succeeded, but that

Raoule has permanently transformed him. None of the prostitutes at his sister’s

141

whorehouse has been able to arouse him. This demonstration of his deﬁnitive
feminization results in his voluntary return to conﬁnement in their bedroom, and grants
Raoule the additional power of legitimate equity. He pays for his inﬁdelity with renewed
devotion that lasts a month. But Jacques’s return to complete femininity brings with it a
renewal of his feminine desire, which Raoule cannot satisfy. He visits de Raittolbe in
cross-dress and attempts to seduce him. When Raoule arrives, she sees that Jacques has
slipped entirely from her control, his coercive power of inﬁdelity nearly made good, if
not for de Raittolbe’s resistance. Her only option is the one she told de Raittolbe she
would adopt when he raised the possibility of inﬁdelity at the outset of her project: she
will destroy him. And she will do so by using his failed masculinity against him, pushing
him into a man’s role she knows he cannot play. He is forced into a duel to defend her
honor, a duel she tells him is just to ﬁrst blood, but which she has told de Raittolbe is to
the death. Lukacher points out that Jacques’s likelihood of success in fencing is as likely
as his success in bearing a child. While the latter requires him to cross impossible gender
barriers, the former requires a nearly equally impossible crossing of class boundaries
(122).

As Jacques waits for the duel to begin, he reﬂects on his behavior. “Oui, certes, il
l’avait offensée, cette femme; mais cet homme, pourquoi lui avait-il fait si mal au cou?...
Ensuite, rien n’était de sa faute!... La prostitution, c’est une maladie! Tous l’avaient eue
dans sa famille: sa mere, sa smur; est-ce qu’il pouvait lutter contre son propre sang?... On
l’avait fait si ﬁlle dans les endroits les plus secrets de son étre, que la folie du vice prenait
les proportions du tétanos! D’ailleurs ce qu’il avait osé vouloir, c’e’tait plus naturel que

ce qu’elle lui avait apprisl” (204). In one last stereotype, Jacques’s femininity appears as

142

an excuse for his behavior. Making him a girl taps into his maternal heritage of
prostitution, the sinful side of the angel-whore dichotomy.3 Because Raoule cannot
control her fallen woman, She resorts to the other male fantasy described by Ross
Chambers, the automaton. Jacques’s story has come full circle, from a living man
surrounded by lifeless ﬂowers to a corpse fallen among the real violets growing in the
grass around him. Holmes observes that Jacques’s death serves the interests of the male
ruling class by removing a subversive impetus to homoeroticism (120). This alignment
of patriarchal wishes with that of such a transgressive daughter further emphasizes the
degree to which Raoule has stepped beyond the bonds of femininity.

Jacques’s death destroys de Raittolbe as well; he rejoins the military and
volunteers for the most dangerous assignments. But Raoule emerges victorious, inverting
the plot resolution that normally awaits female Pygmalion ﬁgures. By reversing the
direction of Galatea’s transformation, Raoule has created a lover fully under her control.
Lukacher sees her collaboration with the German craftsman as a Decadent attack on
maternity amounting to a rejection not only of this role, but also of all the sexual and
social determinants that accompany it (Maternal Fictions 124, “Mlle Baudelaire” 463).
Her wax mannequin retains all Jacques’s beauty, partially derived from the hair, teeth,
and nails she has extracted from his body, yet poses none of the threats. He cannot be
unfaithful, nor can he conﬁne her to one gender. Raoule’s enjoyment of this ﬂexibility is
described in the ﬁnal lines of the novel. “La nuit, une femme vétue de deuil, quelquefois
un jeune homme en habit noir, ouvrent cette porte. Ils viennent S’agenouiller pres du lit,
et, lorsqu’ils ont longtemps contemplé les formes merveilleuses de la statue de cire, ils

l’enlacente, la baisent aux levres. Un ressort dispose a l’intérieur des ﬂancs correspond a

l. 43

 

 

la bouche et l’anime en méme temps qu’il fait S’e’carter les cuisses” (210, 211)’.
Lukacher interprets her gender duality as undecidability, but this plasticity of roles is
arguably Raoule’s goal from the beginning of her project (121). She is not unable to
choose, but rather unwilling to be constrained to do so. Her freedom is so great that she
can fully inhabit both of her incarnations, so completely independent of one another that
she becomes plural and embodies by herself the reunited halves of Plato’s hermaphrodite.
In this Pygmalion story, the female characters emerge much better off than the
males. Raoule has found a solution to her dilemma, and Marie, as proprietor of her own
maison close, has taken a step up from her former profession. Yet neither of these
women proposes an example for other women to follow, just as Rachilde insisted that her
own life was not one to be taken as a model. In the world of Monsieur Ve’nus, there is no
escape from restrictive deﬁnitions of gender roles. The more complete their reversal
becomes, the more Jacques and Raoule fall into stereotypical patterns of the worst gender
behavior. Their exchange, rather than offering another option, only emphasizes the rigid
nature of these roles. Jacques embodies the most negative, limiting aspects of femininity.
His value lies entirely in his appearance, which he learns to use to manipulate those
around him. He is ﬂirtatious and frivolous, devoid of intelligence, integrity, or character.
He is controlled by his sensuality, unable to resist the pull of desire. Although she is a
more fully developed character, Raoule displays the worst of masculinity in much of her
behavior. Her need to control every aspect of her relationship, her ability to emotionally
detach from the situation, and especially her ever-escalating use of violence in the face of
difﬁculty paint an equally negative picture of male gender roles in patriarchal society.

Marie Silvert and the baron de Raittolbe, while remaining in their biologically assigned

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roles, offer little to counter these grim portraits. Raoule’s goal for her relationship with
Jacques is androgyny, “la destruction de leur sexe”, but it proves unattainable with a
living partner. True to the Decadent aesthetic, the artiﬁcial surpasses the real, offering
Raoule the only viable solution to the problem of a woman’s autonomy within a
relationship. Unlike George Sand, Rachilde does not intend to transform society.
Monsieur Vénus diagnoses a problem, but offers no solutions to the dichotomization of
gender roles. Nonetheless, Raoule de Vénérande’s emergence from the relationship as its
victor is a refusal to relegate the female creator to the status of victim, a role played by
MadameDes Belles Cousines, the lady of Pamplona, and Henriette de Mortsauf. What is
missing is a third path, an option for women that neither forces them into one or the other
role of the angel/whore dichotomy, nor insists that they assume the worst characteristics
of men to maintain their independence. In Che'ri, Colette’s Lea explores alternate
solutions.

Colette sets her Pygmalion story, Chéri, in a society largely unburdened
by patriarchal governance. As a member of the demimonde, Le’a de Lonval lives in a
milieu dominated by women, primarily mature women either approaching or beyond
middle age. The only male ﬁgures in Léa’s life that get more than a passing mention are
Patron and Chéri himself. In this setting, a relationship with a man does not threaten
Léa’s independence. There is no threat of censure for illicit sexual activity, no personal
scruples to overcome, no need even for discretion as she engages in her relationship with
Chéri. In fact, there is no one who holds any sway, whether moral, ﬁnancial, or personal,

over her decisions. She has no husband to whom she must remain faithful, no archbishop

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to please, no commitment to patriarchal virtues to overcome. She is freer than even
Balzac’s Lady Dudley.5

The threat she faces is age and its effect on her identity. There is a potential price
to be paid for the freedom Le’a has enjoyed. The patriarchal system, in exchange for the
limits, demands, and expectations it places on a woman, promises ﬁnancial security and
companionship intended to outlast her beauty and desirability via the institution of
marriage. Bearing children multiplies the number of potential caretakers in her old age.
Of course, potentially unfaithful husbands and ungrateful children prevent any ironclad
guarantees, but a married woman is probably less likely to end her days alone than a
woman in Léa’s position. In her world, there are no long-term commitments. When one
relationship ends, a woman must have the ability to attract a new man to begin another.
AS Le’a nears the end of her career, she ﬁnds she has been successful enough to have no
ﬁnancial concerns, but her sense of self is in ﬂux. She sees clearly what lies ahead in the
faces and bodies of her associates, who are older, but not that much older, than She. Yet
she is also aware that despite the inevitability of her aging, she has time left.

At forty-two, she has recently ended her latest relationship and ﬁnds herself at
Charlotte Peloux’s house on the same evening that Cheri ﬁnds himself with nothing to
do. He is nineteen, impossibly beautiful, and interested. Léa takes him as her next, and
last, lover, but he is different from those who preceded him. Spe’le’r’eff and his fellows
provided income, lavish gifts, and a life of luxury that has outlasted them. With Chéri,
the roles are reversed: the older woman attracted to a beautiful young man takes him on
as her lover and “keeps” him. Che’ri is now the courtesan who, as Kloepfer, Borso-

Borgarello, Mecke, Kleinert, and Stern note, is not only young and beautiful, but loves

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jewelry, lacks intelligence, and remains dependent (127). He is therefore a more
stereotypical courtesan than Léa wasf’ Michele Sarde identiﬁes this relationship of
economic domination as the heart of male-female relationships in Colette’s work ( 19).
Her observation reveals a critical dynamic in the power relations between Léa and Chéri.
AS the reader discovers, Chéri has no need of Léa’s ﬁnancial support. His birth made his
mother, and by extension, him as well, very wealthy. Combined with the generosity of
his unidentiﬁed father is Chéri’s own ability to invest wisely to maintain and increase his
holdings. As Léa points out, he has no need to marry Edmée to ensure his ﬁnancial
security, because he is worth more than She is. Thus, Cheri’s acceptance of Le’a’S
ﬁnancial support is entirely voluntary and amounts to his consent to be governed, unlike
Jacques Silvert, whose vastly inferior resources and social standing leave him no choice
but to submit to Raoule and the role she imposes on him.

Despite her adoption of a traditionally masculine role, Léa is not anxious to
relinquish her femininity, as is Raoule de Vénérande. It is precisely her femininity that
she is trying to preserve and enjoy until it runs out. The end result will not be
masculinity, she hopes, like that of Mme Aldonza or the baronne de la Berche, but a
comfortable asexuality. Thus Le'a’s interpretation of the role of “sugar daddy” converts
her authority from the masculine exercise of power to maternal nurturing, a natural
division of roles, according to Mari McCarty, given the age difference between Léa and
Chéri(128). Mieke Bal identiﬁes Léa’s approach to her sexual relationship with Che’ri
from a strong maternal position as a mark of the feminism of Colette’s text. She explains
that Léa is torn between the myth of Marie, the Virgin Mother who functions in a world

without male ﬁgures, and the myth of Eve, the fallen woman, but She refuses to choose

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between the two, transcending destructive sexual ideology (22). To return to French and
Raven’s terminology, the maternal role Léa adopts emphasizes her referent power and
downplays the harder bases of power such as reward or coercive, bases of power Raoule
de Vénérande uses freely. Léa’s choice of bases of power emphasizes the nature of the
relationship she is cultivating.

Although Léa remains very much within the sphere of femininity even as she
plays a traditionally masculine role, Cheri demonstrates a degree of gender ﬂexibility that
is hardly surprising given the dearth of male role models in Chéri’s upbringing. The only
men in his life have been servants and a tutor who stayed on less than a year. Thus it is
left to Léa to teach him as much about masculinity as She sees ﬁt. And his masculinity is
an important facet of the mirror She is polishing. The jealousy of her friends over her
continued beauty and strong health is not enough. She needs to be desired. Rather than
encouraging his feminine attributes as Raoule did with Jacques, she tempers and redirects
them to more suitable, masculine choices. This tendency iS clearly visible in the opening
scene of the novel, which begins with Chéri demanding Léa’s pearls, which she makes
him take off, telling him She is afraid he would accept them if She offered. She reminds
him of what is appropriate for a man again when she tells him She is taking him to buy a
wedding gift — a single pearl. This is an appropriate substitute for her necklace, but needs
to be corrected again when Chéri, excited, wants a pink one. Lea insists on white,
something masculine. This refusal of pink, a color very much associated with Léa and
especially the enclave of her bedroom, underlines as well the necessary separation that

Chéri’s wedding will bring. Becoming a man will require that he give her up.

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But in this ﬁrst scene, he is very much attached. In fact, the opening pages
contain Le’a’s version of Madamedes Belles Cousines’s “vous étes tel que je veuil”: “Lea
sourit de le voir tel qu’elle l’aimait, révolté puis soumis, mal enchainé, incapable d’étre
libre” (720). Suzanne Relyea analyzes the initial description of Chéri as objectifying and
therefore, according to traditional deﬁnitions of gender roles, feminized. She notes that
the portrait is “all the more striking in that one does not frequently encounter perceptions
mediated by unabashed female desire in literature, even in works written by women”
(152).7 This Chéri reﬂects to Léa the vision of herself She wants to see, a woman whose
power is granted her voluntarily, a powerful attachment that is chosen out of desire,
respect, and affection, not need, fear, or weakness. The real bond between them is love,
but neither has recognized it as such. That Léa holds the power in the relationship is
without doubt.

This scene, though it begins the novel, comes near the end of their 6-year
relationship. To see how Léa initiated and nurtured this bond while shaping her partner,
we need to travel back with Léa in memory to the beginning. Léa has known Chéri his
entire life. The story of his childhood is recounted through her eyes, a childhood in -
which She was often present, “amie trop familiere, sorte de marraine-géiteau qu’il
tutoyait” (734). As he reaches adolescence, Léa is the one who holds him responsible for
his behavior, pointing out that his lifestyle is ruining his health. Her observations of his
pallor and weakness and her offer of a remedy set in motion the events that initiate an
intimate and exclusive relationship between them. She extends her invitation to
Normandy out of the maternal, nurturing Side of her character that has always played a

role in her relationships with her lovers, who are always younger. When she later

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contemplates her next move after breaking off with Cheri, she tells herself, “Et c’est a
moi qu’elle doit beaucoup, cette chair fraiche! Combien sont-ils a me devoir leur sante',
leur beauté, des chagrins bien sains et des laits de poule pour leurs rhumes, et l’habitude
de faire l’amour sans negligence et sans monotonic?” (796).

This second aspect of her self-image, her skill in love, resonates unexpectedly
when Chéri, cradled comfortably in her arms and playing with her strand of pearls,
demands a kiss. The scene recalls Heptaméron 26 in many ways. The young man, in
love with an older and wiser woman but perceiving her as out of reach, sows his wild oats
elsewhere, indulging to the point of making himself Sick. He comes back to his faithful

friend who nurtures him back to health and thus demonstrates her superiority over her

 

counterparts. Emboldened by the evidence of her affection for him, the young man I
makes his move, asking his friend to protect him from the inﬂuence of other women by
replacing them. Of course, Marguerite de Navarre’s heroine has long desired the
seigneur d’Avannes, but her commitment to patriarchal standards of virtue blocks her
from acting on it. Le'a, on the other hand, is caught off guard, both by Chéri’s demand
and by her own reaction to it. Her moral standards do not prevent her from acting on her
desire, but she is cautious about on whose terms this relationship will proceed. The
power struggle that follows determines not whether there will be intimacy between them,
but who will have the upper hand. Chéri wins the ﬁrst points by his quick recovery and
his observation that Léa’s mind is going places he had not suggested. Léa retreats to the
banality of trip planning, in which Chéri seems to propose a compromise: an equal
division of expenses, an equal division of power. Léa laughs, but when he calls her back

to him, She demonstrates her own strength, based not on the element of surprise but on

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real seductive power. “Elle l’embrassa si bien qu’ils se délierent ivres, assourdis,
essoufﬂe’s, tremblants comme s’ils venaient de se battre... Elle se remit debout devant lui
qui n’avait pas bougé, qui gisait toujours au fond du fauteuil et elle 1e déﬁait tout bas:

« Hein?.. Hein?... » et elle s’attendait a étre insultée. Mais il lui tendit les bras, ouvrit ses
belles mains incertaines, renversa une téte blessée et montra entre ses cils l’e’tincelle
double de deux larmes, tandis qu’il murmurait des paroles, des plaintes, tout un chant
animal et amoureux ou elle distinguait son nom, des « chérie... » des « viens... » des

« plus te quitter... » un chant qu’elle écoutait penchée et pleine d’anxiété, comme Si elle
lui eﬁt, par me’garde, fait tres mal” (73 8,9).

By initiating an erotic element to their relationship, Chéri Shows Léa that he can
be the mirror she needs, reﬂecting not only her skill at caring for and developing young
men, but also her desirability. Cheri’s effect on other women and his potential to seduce
any number of them at will heightens his value and adds an element of pride at being his
choice. But Léa’s response makes it clear that while she is not immune to Cheri’s
attractions, She is the one who will control the relationship. Thus, the trip to Normandy
that Léa initially offers as a friend concerned about his health becomes the beginning of
an intimate relationship that will have lasting signiﬁcance for them both. Yannick Resch
notes that in Colette’s work, “Men are the object of admiration and desire... They need
take no greater initiative than to let themselves go, to let themselves be loved, thereby
rapidly becoming objects of consumption” (142).

Le’a’s ﬁrst intention is to save Che'ri from himself. On the night their relationship
begins, she tells him, “Tu t’abimes” (736). She Spends the ﬁrst month in Normandy

feeding him and letting him rest, disappointed but patient with his general lack of desire.

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_ _ ___t-
41k

 

l

Then She brings Patron to train him in boxing, building his strength and stamina. Her
efforts pay off. When Chéri arrived, he was exhausted, spending his days sleeping and
waiting to go to bed. “Robuste a present, ﬁer de ses dix-neuf ans, gai a table, impatient
au lit”, Léa has restored his health and kindled his desire.8 Having accomplished this
goal, she means to take him back to Paris and to his “cheres études”, but instead she
repeatedly delays their return, waiting for what has always followed with all her previous
lovers: “la conﬁance, la détente, les aveux, la sincérité, l’indiscréte expansion d’un jeune
arnant” that mark for Léa the real surrender of oneself. Chéri’s withholding of self-
revelation is more than she can stand. For Le'a, the expression of gratitude from her lover
is less a basis of legitimate reciprocity to be exercised in order to wield further inﬂuence
than a recompense for the energy she invests in them. When Chéri appears at her house a
day after their return to Paris, still unwilling to verbalize his feelings but communicating
them nonetheless, Le’a’s reaction demonstrates the pleasure She takes in the reward.
“Chéri feignait le somrneil, la langueur, pour pouvoir mieux serrer les dents et fermer les
yeux, en proie a une fureur de mutisme. Mais elle l’écoutait quand meme, couche’e
contre lui, elle écoutait avec délices la vibration légere, le tumulte lointain et comme
captif dont résonne un corps qui nie son angoisse, sa gratitude et son amour” (741).
Thus, Le’a has completed Chéri’s transformation into a strong, healthy, and emotionally
attached lover who will not return to his self-destructive lifestyle along with his return to
Paris, but will remain bound to his benefactress.

The nature of the bonds between them is critical to the continued success of the
relationship and dictates Léa’s choice of the bases of power she is willing to exercise.

Referent power has to be the key to her inﬂuence over Chéri and his principal reason for

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staying with her because his real value to her lies in his free choice of her as his lover, a
value that would be diminished if she had to exercise coercive power to keep him, or if he
stayed with her because of her reward power. Any modiﬁcations of his behavior have to
result from his desire to maintain and strengthen their relationship, for it is this desire that
reﬂects back to Léa the image of herself that she seeks: a beautiful, nurturing, and
desirable woman.

The preservation of this image rules out not only coercive and reward power, but
informational and legitimate dependence powers as well. Léa exercises legitimate
position power in small ways as She mothers Cheri, trying to correct his bad habits. Her
admonitions to not smoke before noon, to stop crinkling his nose when he laughs, to not
throw his clothes all over her bedroom, and to not choose a pink pearl as his wedding gift
all carry a distinctly maternal tone that relies on her ﬁlling this role for him in response to
his own mother’s failure to do so effectively. Léa could exercise powers of legitimate
reciprocity, but as discussed earlier, the gratitude of her young lovers serves more as a
reward for her efforts than as a basis of power.

The basis of power she has at her disposal but ﬂatly refuses to exercise is that of
legitimate equity. When Chéri returns to her after Six months of separation, they replay
the dynamics of their entire relationship. Léa starts out mocking and aloof, reinforcing
her own referent power but refusing to reveal the referent power he has over her by
letting him see how she has suffered at his absence. Her exploitation of his jealousy
when he sees a new ring reveals the importance of maintaining power. “L’accent rendait
a Léa toute son autorité et elle se permit 1e plaisir d’égarer un peu plus celui qui lui

laissait l’avantage” (810). When he obeys her command to apologize for his unruly

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behavior, she rewards him with a caress, and receives in response powerful evidence of
the referent power that has always been central to their relationship. “Nounoune chérie!
Je te retrouve! ma Nounoune! 6 ma Nounoune, ton e'paule, et puis ton meme parfurn, et
ton collier, ma Nounoune, ah!” (811). Her position ﬁrmly established, and reinforced by
a confession of love, Léa foresees the rekindling of their desire, but delays it by returning
to her role as nurturer. But when Le’a confesses her love as well, Chéri’s desire will not
be delayed any longer. After their lovemaking, Léa revels in a surge of absolute referent
power. Her resignation to old age, her attempts to let go of Chéri no longer appear
necessary. The evidence of the events that have just occurred reafﬁrrns her beauty, her

desirability, and Chéri’s devotion to her. “11 est la! Laissant sa maison, sa petite femme

 

niaise et jolie, il est revenu, il m’est revenu! Qui pourrait me l’enlever?” (815). But her .I
power is short-lived. In the morning they are both forced to come to terms with their age
difference and the necessity of ending their relationship. The nature of Léa’s project is
revealed as She pushes Chéri back into his role of dependent adolescent, a young man
who needs her to nurture him, to make plans for him, and to Show him what he really
wants, yet who is old enough to admire her beauty, wit, and charm, and to desire her.
But in her absence, Cheri has been forced to grow up enough to see the effect she
has on him and to recognize that it cannot continue indeﬁnitely. He knows he has to end
it, but recognizes how much Léa has meant and still means to him. He wants the ending
of this relationship to be exceptional, steeped in memories of graciousness and nurturing
generosity. Therefore, for the ﬁrst time, he exercises real power in their relationship,
power that begins with his gaze. Bethany Ladimer notes that throughout Colette’s work,

the gaze is the act of only one partner, marking his or her power over the other at the

154

same time as desire (59). Throughout the novel, Chéri has been the object of Léa’s gaze,
but on the morning after their last night together, he pretends to sleep as he watches her
get out of bed, seeing her objectively as she moves around the room unguardedly,
unaware that she is being observed. “Pas encore poudre'e, une maigre torsade de cheveux
sur la nuque, le menton double et le cou dévaste', elle s’offrait imprudemment au regard
invisible” (818). This temporary exchange of roles prepares the scene that follows.
When Chéri sits Speechless as Léa talks about their departure, she comments that
he acts as if he were still twelve years old. He tells her, “Avec toi, Nounoune, il y a des
chances pour que j’aie douze ans pendant un demi-Siecle” (820). This is not an
observation, but an accusation. Léa recognizes immediately the change in Chéri, from
the strength of his hand as he holds hers to the directness of his gaze. Confronted with
this new power, she is unable to ﬁnd the reprimand that will trigger the insult, the
pouting, and the forgiveness that have always characterized Cheri’s attempts at the
exercise of his will. This exercise of Cheri’s legitimate equity, his pointing out of the
injury She has done him by preserving him in a State of perpetual adolescence, lays the
groundwork for his release. When Léa reacts angrily ﬁrst at his pity and then at the
realization that he is slipping away from her, Chéri exercises power again, this time in the
form of reward power balanced by a subtle coercion. In his “je te defends de m’ab‘imer
ma Nounoune”, he threatens to distort the image he has always reﬂected back to her, the
image that has made him so valuable a mirror. He rewards her compliance with a full
revelation of all that she has meant to him, an embellishment and enhancement of that
image with facets Le'a never knew he had captured. He recalls her concern that Chéri

would be unkind to Edmée as he prepared to marry her, and again at his return to her, his

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suffering in her absence, the praises he sang to Desmond about her: the beauty of her
skin, the blue of her eyes, the sharpness of her tongue, the way she dressed, talked,
walked, smiled. “Ah! ce n’est pas rien, qu’une femme comme Léa!” (825). But in his
unveiling of his thoughts, he steps too close to the present and, though he stops short of
verbalizing it, lets Le’a see what he sees now, an old woman.

Her reaction to his Slip demonstrates that his exercise of power has had the
desired effect. Le’a retreats from her momentary lapse into the role of abandoned lover
and returns to her usual clear-sighted magnanimity, consequently restoring the mother-
child dynamic of their relationship. Chéri’s reward of the long-awaited full confession of

his love and admiration has restored Léa’s conﬁdence in her referent power, even though

 

it may now be faded. But when she puts her arms around Cheri’s shoulders and he
stiffens, “la défense de ce corps qui souffrait parce qu’elle était blessée”, she refuses to
exercise the power of legitimate equity he is granting her (825). Because he no longer
desires her, because it is no longer appropriate for him to desire her, she has to let him go.
Instead of capitalizing on the pain he has caused her, she focuses on the harm she has
done, transferring the power of legitimate equity to him. It is on this basis that She ﬁnds
the strength to send him back to his young wife and his own youth, and it is her own
strength that she must rely on. After Chéri’s brief exercise of power and his useless
protest as she verbalizes what he was thinking, “Tu arrives ici, et tu trouves une vieille
femme”, he does not utter another word during Le’a’s reﬂections, confessions, and
instructions, reinforcing his role as her reﬂector (825). The mirror deprived of its original

is left empty and purposeless.

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The end of Chéri suggests that he has emerged from the relationship relatively
better off than Léa, who is left to confront her new identity as an old woman alone, while
he returns to a wife and a future, ﬁlling his lungs with air as he leaves Léa’s house,
“comme un évade’” (828). But his Silence in the last three pages of the novel indicates his
emptiness when out off from Léa. Relyea oberves, “Le'a exists in, of, and for herself.

She is the subject, the self of the novel. Cheri never accedes to real being: he has a
function in Le’a’s life but is nothing, if not that function, even unto himself” (153). La
Fin de Chéri shows the aftermath of this situation.

Le’a succeeds in her transition to the next phase of her life, a transformation for
which she prepares throughout Chéri. She studies Lili and her inappropriately coquettish
relationships with men even younger than Chéri, or Mme Aldonza, deformed by
rheumatism and wearing her black wig crookedly, or the baronne de la Berche,
frighteningly virilized by old age. Rather than sliding into one of these roles, she makes a
conscious decision about what the next phase of her life will be. Despite a few false
starts and second thoughts, her relinquishing of Che'ri enables her to follow through on
her plans for a digniﬁed, asexual, and contented old age. The narrator of la Fin de Chéri
never lets us back in to Le’a’s thoughts, forcing us to observe her from a distance as Chéri
does. But the picture that emerges is one of peace and contentment.

Chéri, on the other hand, cannot rise to Léa’s expectations that he will ﬁll the
gaps she has left in his education. When the story picks up six years later, Chéri has
returned from the war, but cannot ﬁll his role as “pére de famille”. Anne Duhamel
Ketchum explains Chéri’s failure. “Because he did not learn the patriarchal law, Chéri

cannot survive in a male world; but because of this, he is Chéri. He has never learned

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that power constitutes the distinction and thus the deﬁnition of man in relation to woman”
(26). Left feeling cold, empty, and abandoned by his Nounoune, Chéri needs a mother,
and Edmée is too young to ﬁll the role. She manages to grow up, but does so by
plunging herself into meaningful work that takes her in a new direction, away from her
husband. Thus, Chéri ﬁnds himself unable to connect with his wife or with society in
general. He ﬁnds the void Léa left in his life impossible to ﬁll. Like Rousseau, he is
bound by a longing for a person who no longer exists. But Chéri cannot even resent her
for choosing another over him. Léa let him go for his own good and has settled into a
comfortable celibacy in his absence. No longer able to take comfort in the stories and

pictures of Le’a at the height of her beauty, or to content himself with substitute as false as

 

la Copine’s pearls, Cheri commits suicide. Although Léa plays no active role in bringing
about Cheri’s death, it is a direct consequence, albeit one beyond her control, of their
relationship.

The female Pygmalion ﬁgures in this and Rachilde’s texts represent a signiﬁcant
evolution from the heroines that appear earlier in French literary history. In the earlier
texts, the women are clearly the losers in the outcomes of their relationships. In
Rousseau and Sand, we reach a draw in the battle between creator and creation, female
and male. But these texts Show us Pygmalion ﬁgures who are able to survive playing
God. The critical difference between these women and their predecessors is that they do
not allow their relationships with their creations, or with any man, to deﬁne them. For
Raoule and Léa, Jacques and Chéri are Signiﬁcant episodes, but part of a longer life story

that continues after the relationship ends.

158

Despite the reversal in outcome from the male creation’s survival at the female
creator’s expense to the success of the female creator and the destruction of her object,
these relationships remain a zero-sum game. Rachilde and Colette succeed in creating
protagonists who reverse the traditional gender roles, but cannot transcend them. These
reversals serve a purpose, accentuating the injustice and violence that occurs so often in
male-female relationships, whether literary or real. Our shock at Chéri’s destruction
translates into a re-evaluation of our acceptance of the female heroine’s death for love,
but offers no alternatives. The unidirectional exercise of power limits any relationship
between creator and creation, rendering impossible the cooperation, ﬂexibility, and

communication necessary for a relationship in which both parties can avoid

 

objectiﬁcation and attain subjecthood. l

159

Conclusion

In Ovid’s version of the myth (Metamorphoses, book X), Pygmalion’s Skill as a
sculptor allowed him to avoid involvement with the promiscuous, lascivious women
around him by creating a modest, devoted companion, whom the sympathetic goddess
Venus brought to life. Throughout the history of French literature, female Pygmalions
have played the roles of both the goddess and the sculptor, trying to train and socialize an
ideal male partner for themselves. They represent exceptional cases. Ordinarily, women
have faced serious challenges as they sought meaningful relationships with men, because
the patriarchy strictly limits their power. Whether considered the possession of their
fathers or husbands, granted the same legal status as minors, or refused the right to own
property or seek divorce, women have been disadvantaged in their ability to determine
their own fate. But following Pygmalion’s example with genders reversed offers female
protagonists and the authors who create them the opportunity to confront the inequities
women face and to explore alternatives. Widowhood or Special situations that confer
unusual wealth or social power on the exceptional woman allow her to transcend her
normal condition of subservience to the privileged male.

Many of these protagonists’ issues involve marriage. Madamedes Belles
Cousines and Raoule de Vénérande ﬁnd themselves in the rare position of having the
resources to defy society’s expectations. Neither is willing to sacriﬁce the freedom She
has had the good fortune to attain, so each trains a lover who will not threaten it.
Marguerite’s lady of Pamplona, Henriette de Mortsauf, and Madeleine Blanchet all ﬁnd

themselves in unsatisfying marriages. Whether too much older, mentally unstable, or

160

 

 

emotionally distant, these women’s husbands all have shortcomings that pique their
wives’ interest in other men. Despite their marital dissatisfaction, these women value
their virtue and so are unwilling to solve their problem conventionally by taking a lover.
They turn to Pygmalion’s model to sculpt an extramarital partner who will love them
chastely, either by embracing virtue and suppressing their passionate impulses, or by
becoming an adoring son.

Neither Lea de Lonval nor Mme de Warens need be concerned about marriage,
but they, like their peers, wrestle with the question of how to sustain a quasi-maternal
role. The breakdown of mother-child relationships plays an important role in the
formation of all the reversed-gender Pygmalion and Galatea couples. The young men in
these stories need a mother ﬁgure, whether they have been separated from their own
mother by distance, death, abandonment, or neglect and indifference up until the time
their female mentors meet them, and none of the female Pygmalion ﬁgures has been a
fully satisﬁed mother. Five of the seven have no children; Henriette’s son and daughter
have inherited their father’s constitutional weakness and are unlikely to see adulthood.
Sand’s Madeleine Blanchet has a strong, healthy son; her only complaint would be that

She wanted more children, but her cooling relationship with her husband makes that

unlikely. Thus, even though Henriette and Madeleine have children of their own, there is

still a space to be ﬁlled in their lives by an adopted son. All the women, by taking on
their Pygmalion projects, act on an impulse to teach, shape, and nurture that remains
strong despite their otherwise unconventional roles in ﬁgures such as Mme de Warens,
Raoule de Vénérande, and Léa de Lonval. The mother’s role is a natural point from

which a woman can exercise power over a male because it is a position even patriarchy

161

 

 

will grant her. Her power does not transgress the established boundaries until erotic love
and the desire to control play a part, passions that shift her role from nurturing mother to
obsessed sculptor. George Sand’s Madeleine is the exception. Hers is the only
relationship that does not end in death or disgrace for one member of the couple because
She remains a mother to Francois until he has established his independence from her, an
independence she prepares him for and encourages him to exercise. There is a
demarcation line between their mother-son relationship and their passionate love that
allows them to interact as equals and live happily ever after.

Freud might argue that Madeleine is the only one of these seven protagonists that

has successfully made the transition from narcissistic desire for the self, which he ﬁnds at ,

 

the base of all female desire, to the object-love that women are able to develop through .I
motherhood.’ And indeed we see varying degrees of narcissistic tendencies in the six
other female subjects of this study. By being successfully dominated through forms of
training that allow them to excel beyond whatever they might achieve on their own, all
the young men reﬂect back an image of power to their female mentor-dominators. Each
is tailored differently, to suit the needs of his sculptor. Saintré’s development into a
perfect chivalric model demonstrates Madamedes Belles Cousines’ mastery of court life
and its workings. Through the virtue that the women they love impose on them, the
seigneur d’AvanneS and F élix de Vandenesse reﬂect an image of their lady’s powerful
desirability reigned in by her unassailable chastity. Mme de Warens proves less
successful. She engages Jean-Jacques Rousseau in activities she enjoys, enlisting his aid
in her experiments, encouraging his interests in music, and attempting to teach him social

graces. But his failure to reﬂect the enterprising aspects of her nature as well as his

162

inability to adopt her ﬂexible attitude toward sexual relations play important roles in her
decision to replace him. And although she is not domineering, George Sand’s Madeleine
herself is drawn to Francois because he demonstrates deep compassion for those around
him, putting their needs before his own in the same way she does. Thus he implicitly
validates her own chosen code of ethics. More complicated and at times mutually
contradictory demands are placed on the relatively recent male Galateas in French
literature by women. Perhaps this situation reﬂects the greater difﬁculty that French
women may have encountered in exercising their autonomy during a period when society
was offering them a wider range of choices: divorce, for example, became legal only in
1884.2 Jacques Silvert has the complicated task of mirroring Raoule de Vénérande’s
gender ﬂexibility, playing weakness to her strength, poverty to her wealth, male to her
female, yet femininity to her masculinity. His failure, in the form of homoerotic
impulses, leads to his destruction. Finally, Chéri’s role as a dependent and somewhat
spoiled child allows Le'a to study her ability to nurture, provide, and sometimes indulge,
while his role as her lover reassures her of her continued beauty and desirability and her
success in her battle against age as She nears the age of ﬁfty. When Chéri can no longer
reﬂect this image, through no fault of his own but simply because of the passage of time,
Léa recognizes the need to let him go, but it is Chéri’s inability to step out of the ﬁrst role
that proves to be his undoing. These relationships, except for Madeleine and F rancois’s,
all fail when the statue reﬂects a distorted image of its maker, suggesting that the
protagonist derives a measure of narcissistic pleasure from her relationship, but also
that—as Hegel’s Master-Slave dialectic suggests—the Master is dependent on the Slave

for her sense of identity.3

163

Such relationships, which test traditional power structures, can best be explored
on the margins of society, where there is greater freedom to question conventionality.
Madamedes Belles Cousines achieves greater freedom through her Widowhood. Her
escape from the system of exchange allows her to take a lover she can control. Her
husband’s age pushes Marguerite’s protagonist to the edges of Pamplonan society. She
rarely goes out, dresses modestly, and behaves in exemplary fashion. Her semi-
withdrawal from society and her husband’s extraordinary trust in her allow her to
experiment with a new kind of lover who will adore her yet respect her virtue. Likewise,
Henriette de Mortsauf ‘s husband motivates her withdrawal from society, not because of
his age but because of the need to hide his mental instability. Deprived of most social
contact, Henriette tries to form Félix into a companion who will love and support her yet,
like d’Avannes, not challenge her commitment to chastity. Madame de Warens’s
separation from her husband, conversion from Protestantism to Catholicism, status as a
foreigner, and unconventional moral education all serve to alienate her from mainstream
society, permitting her a freedom undoubtedly shared by few women of her era. The
entire setting of George Sand’s novel may have been considered marginal to many of her
readers. By situating her story in the Berry, she frees all her characters from the strictures
of urban society. Madeleine gains additional freedom from her husband’s lack of interest
in her and her activites. AS an orphan, Raoule de Vénérande can freely marginalize
herself by refusing to marry. Raoule’s secure position in the upper echelons of the
aristocratic establishment enables her to further ﬂout tradition by involving herself with

someone decidedly outside polite society. Finally, Léa, as a member of the demimonde,

164

 

 

escapes all expectations to marry and have children and has the ﬁnancial resources to
determine how She wants to live.

Despite their shared concerns with marriage, maternity and marginality, these
texts differ in important ways, revealing the changing function of female Pygmalion
ﬁgures as we move from the ﬁfteenth to the twentieth century and shift from
predominantly male to exclusively female writers. The earlier texts by male authors
place a woman in Pygmalion’s role to serve her protégé’s ends. A signiﬁcant element of
adolescent male fantasy informs these texts, in which the young man ﬁnds a beautiful,
experienced older woman to initiate him in the ways of love and life, teaching him skills
that he can take with him as he moves on to other conquests. In the novels by de la Sale,
Balzac, and Rousseau, the male emerges as the winner, ﬁnding success he owes in great
measure to the woman who loved him. Jehan de Saintré becomes one of France’s
greatest knights thanks to the Sponsorship and education he received from his lady while
Madamedes Belles Cousines is publicly humiliated, effectively stripped of the power that
enabled her to help Saintré. Likewise, Félix de Vandenesse beneﬁts Signiﬁcantly from
his relationship with Mme de Mortsauf. He follows Henriette’s advice and proﬁts from
her connections in Parisian society to secure himself an enviable position with the king,
as well as considerable social standing. After her death, brought on by her inability to act
on her passion and her fears that he had abandoned her, Fe’lix moves on to other women,
including the recipient of the letter that forms the majority of the text of the Lys dans la
vallée. Rousseau. surprisingly, provides a more realistic version of the male protégé’s
story. He proﬁts from his relationship with Mme de Warens, receiving food and housing

as well a mooring in his otherwise itinerant life. She provides him with love and security

165

 

and, by his own attribution, gives him the impetus to succeed. He professes to a desire to
repay her that propels him throughout his career, long after their relationship has ended.
Although Balzac’s text hints at a similar dynamic, Rousseau’s story clearly demonstrates
that reversed Pygmalion relationships have negative as well as positive effects on the
young men who are transformed by them. Although Rousseau never acknowledges the
exploitative component of their relationship, its aftermath prevents him from engaging in
other signiﬁcant long-term relationships for the rest of his life.

Texts by women authors eliminate such male fantasizing, instead recounting
Pygmalion projects undertaken primarily for the sculptor’s beneﬁt. Even Marguerite’s
early modern text differs signiﬁcantly from Balzac’s romantic version of her story.
D’Avannes reaps few rewards from his relationship with the lady of Pamplona. AS the
king’s younger brother, he already holds signiﬁcant social status and wealth. The grace
and beauty that attracted the lady’s gaze are admired by other women as well. Thus the
only beneﬁt he may derive from the relationship is the one his sculptor intended: a
greater sense of virtue which will safeguard him from future excesses like those he
indulged in with the folle. But the lady of Pamplona undertakes even this transformation
not for his beneﬁt, but for her own. Sublirnating d’AvanneS’s desire permits her the
unique prospect of taking a lover without compromising her virtue. The relationship
between Madeleine and Francois hardly meets the criteria of male fantasy, either. By
taking in a foundling, Madeleine inadvertently shapes an ideal partner for herself, but no
consummation of their love takes place until they have agreed to a lifetime commitment.
Francois will make no future conquests based on the knowledge he gains from

Madeleine. As we reach Rachilde’s and Colette’s texts, we ﬁnd that the balance of proﬁt

166

 

 

and loss has been reversed. Jacques and Che'ri are sacriﬁced when they can no longer
fulﬁll the function for which they were designed. Raoule’s sacriﬁce of Jacques is sudden
and violent, restoring her power and reversing not only the gender roles in the Pygmalion
myth but also the transformation ﬁom lifelessness to being. Chéri’s sacriﬁce has been
more gradual and inadvertent, resulting from Léa’s greater concern for their mutual
pleasure than for his development into a man. What is groundbreaking about Rachilde’s
and Colette’s texts, at least in the context of this study, is their presentation of the love
relationship as a chapter in a longer life story of a female protagonist. Both women had
lives before they met the young man who plays a central role in the novel and both, we

may be sure, live on after the relationship is over. This is especially true of Léa. Che’ri

 

plays an important role in her ability to reshape her identity as she ages, ﬁrst assuring her
of her continued femininity and then helping her see that the time has come for her to
embrace the role of old woman and to play it as She has planned. But he remains a
supporting cast member to Léa’s starring role.

Although our women authors, unlike their male counterparts, readily place a
female character in a power position for the long term, freeing her from the status of
victim, none of them would have called herself a feminist. For Marguerite, the term is
simply anachronistic, but George Sand, Rachilde, and Colette all overtly refused it.
Despite their lack of interest in female solidarity, these women clearly understood the
value of independence and the ﬂexibility gained by living on the margins of society and
were willing to appropriate them for their protagonists.4

Unquestionably, permanent power imbalances in relationships are destructive,

whether the dominant power is exercised by a male or a female. Analyzing these reverse

167

inability to adopt her ﬂexible attitude toward sexual relations play important roles in her
decision to replace him. And although She is not domineering, George Sand’s Madeleine
herself is drawn to Francois because he demonstrates deep compassion for those around
him, putting their needs before his own in the same way she does. Thus he implicitly
validates her own chosen code of ethics. More complicated and at times mutually
contradictory demands are placed on the relatively recent male Galateas in French
literature by women. Perhaps this situation reﬂects the greater difﬁculty that French
women may have encountered in exercising their autonomy during a period when society
was offering them a wider range of choices: divorce, for example, became legal only in

1884.2 Jacques Silvert has the complicated task of mirroring Raoule de Vénérande’s

 

gender ﬂexibility, playing weakness to her strength, poverty to her wealth, male to her I
female, yet femininity to her masculinity. His failure, in the form of homoerotic
impulses, leads to his destruction. Finally, Cheri’s role as a dependent and somewhat
spoiled child allows Léa to study her ability to nurture, provide, and sometimes indulge,
while his role as her lover reassures her of her continued beauty and desirability and her
success in her battle against age as she nears the age of ﬁfty. When Cheri can no longer
reﬂect this image, through no fault of his own but Simply because of the passage of time,
Léa recognizes the need to let him go, but it is Chéri’s inability to step out of the ﬁrst role
that proves to be his undoing. These relationships, except for Madeleine and FrancoiS’s,
all fail when the statue reﬂects a distorted image of its maker, suggesting that the
protagonist derives a measure of narcissistic pleasure from her relationship, but also
that—as Hegel’s Master-Slave dialectic suggests—the Master is dependent on the Slave

for her sense of identity.3

163

that power constitutes the distinction and thus the deﬁnition of man in relation to woman”
(26). Left feeling cold, empty, and abandoned by his Nounoune, Cheri needs a mother,
and Edmée is too young to ﬁll the role. She manages to grow up, but does so by
plunging herself into meaningﬁrl work that takes her in a new direction, away from her
husband. Thus, Chéri ﬁnds himself unable to connect with his wife or with society in
general. He ﬁnds the void Le'a left in his life impossible to ﬁll. Like Rousseau, he is
bound by a longing for a person who no longer exists. But Chéri cannot even resent her
for choosing another over him. Léa let him go for his own good and has settled into a
comfortable celibacy in his absence. No longer able to take comfort in the stories and
pictures of Léa at the height of her beauty, or to content himself with substitute as false as
la Copine’s pearls, Chéri commits suicide. Although Léa plays no active role in bringing
about Chéri’s death, it is a direct consequence, albeit one beyond her control, of their
relationship.

The female Pygmalion ﬁgures in this and Rachilde’s texts represent a signiﬁcant
evolution from the heroines that appear earlier in French literary history. In the earlier
texts, the women are clearly the losers in the outcomes of their relationships. In
Rousseau and Sand, we reach a draw in the battle between creator and creation, female
and male. But these texts Show us Pygmalion ﬁgures who are able to survive playing
God. The critical difference between these women and their predecessors is that they do
not allow their relationships with their creations, or with any man, to deﬁne them. For
Raoule and Léa, Jacques and Cheri are signiﬁcant episodes, but part of a longer life story

that continues after the relationship ends.

158

Despite the reversal in outcome from the male creation’s survival at the female
creator’s expense to the success of the female creator and the destruction of her object,
these relationships remain a zero-sum game. Rachilde and Colette succeed in creating
protagonists who reverse the traditional gender roles, but cannot transcend them. These
reversals serve a purpose, accentuating the injustice and violence that occurs so often in
male-female relationships, whether literary or real. Our Shock at Chéri’s destruction
translates into a re-evaluation of our acceptance of the female heroine’s death for love,
but offers no alternatives. The unidirectional exercise of power limits any relationship
between creator and creation, rendering impossible the cooperation, ﬂexibility, and
communication necessary for a relationship in which both parties can avoid

objectiﬁcation and attain subjecthood.

159

Conclusion

In Ovid’s version of the myth (Metamorphoses, book X), Pygmalion’s skill as a
sculptor allowed him to avoid involvement with the promiscuous, lascivious women
around him by creating a modest, devoted companion, whom the sympathetic goddess
Venus brought to life. Throughout the history of French literature, female Pygmalions
have played the roles of both the goddess and the sculptor, trying to train and socialize an
ideal male partner for themselves. They represent exceptional cases. Ordinarily, women
have faced serious challenges as they sought meaningful relationships with men, because
the patriarchy strictly limits their power. Whether considered the possession of their
fathers or husbands, granted the same legal status as minors, or refused the right to own
property or seek divorce, women have been disadvantaged in their ability to determine
their own fate. But following Pygmalion’s example with genders reversed offers female
protagonists and the authors who create them the opportunity to confront the inequities
women face and to explore alternatives. Widowhood or special situations that confer
unusual wealth or social power on the exceptional woman allow her to transcend her
normal condition of subservience to the privileged male.

Many of these protagonists’ issues involve marriage. Madamedes Belles
Cousines and Raoule de Vénérande ﬁnd themselves in the rare position of having the
resources to defy society’s expectations. Neither is willing to sacriﬁce the freedom she
has had the good fortune to attain, so each trains a lover who will not threaten it.
Marguerite’s lady of Pamplona, Henriette de Mortsauf, and Madeleine Blanchet all ﬁnd

themselves in unsatisfying marriages. Whether too much older, mentally unstable, or

160

emotionally distant, these women’s husbands all have shortcomings that pique their
wives’ interest in other men. Despite their marital dissatisfaction, these women value
their virtue and so are unwilling to solve their problem conventionally by taking a lover.
They turn to Pygmalion’s model to sculpt an extramarital partner who will love them
chastely, either by embracing virtue and suppressing their passionate impulses, or by
becoming an adoring son.

Neither Léa de Lonval nor Mme de Warens need be concerned about marriage,
but they, like their peers, wrestle with the question of how to sustain a quasi-maternal
role. The breakdown of mother-child relationships plays an important role in the
formation of all the reversed-gender Pygmalion and Galatea couples. The young men in
these stories need a mother ﬁgure, whether they have been separated from their own
mother by distance, death, abandonment, or neglect and indifference up until the time
their female mentors meet them, and none of the female Pygmalion ﬁgures has been a
fully satisﬁed mother. Five of the seven have no children; Henriette’s son and daughter
have inherited their father’s constitutional weakness and are unlikely to see adulthood.
Sand’S Madeleine Blanchet has a strong, healthy son; her only complaint would be that
she wanted more children, but her cooling relationship with her husband makes that
unlikely. Thus, even though Henriette and Madeleine have children of their own, there is
still a Space to be ﬁlled in their lives by an adopted son. All the women, by taking on
their Pygmalion projects, act on an impulse to teach, shape, and nurture that remains
strong despite their otherwise unconventional roles in ﬁgures such as Mme de Warens,
Raoule de Vénérande, and Léa de Lonval. The mother’s role is a natural point from

which a woman can exercise power over a male because it is a position even patriarchy

161

will grant her. Her power does not transgress the established boundaries until erotic love
and the desire to control play a part, passions that shift her role from nurturing mother to
obsessed sculptor. George Sand’s Madeleine is the exception. Hers is the only
relationship that does not end in death or disgrace for one member of the couple because
she remains a mother to Francois until he has established his independence from her, an
independence she prepares him for and encourages him to exercise. There is a
demarcation line between their mother-son relationship and their passionate love that
allows them to interact as equals and live happily ever after.

Freud might argue that Madeleine is the only one of these seven protagonists that
has successfully made the transition from narcissistic desire for the self, which he ﬁnds at
the base of all female desire, to the object-love that women are able to develop through
motherhood.1 And indeed we see varying degrees of narcissistic tendencies in the Six
other female subjects of this study. By being successfully dominated through forms of
training that allow them to excel beyond whatever they might achieve on their own, all
the young men reﬂect back an image of power to their female mentor-dominators. Each
is tailored differently, to suit the needs of his sculptor. Saintré’s development into a
perfect chivalric model demonstrates Madamedes Belles Cousines’ mastery of court life
and its workings. Through the virtue that the women they love impose on them, the
seigneur d’Avannes and Félix de Vandenesse reﬂect an image of their lady’s powerful
desirability reigned in by her unassailable chastity. Mme de Warens proves less
successful. She engages Jean-Jacques Rousseau in activities she enjoys, enlisting his aid
in her experiments, encouraging his interests in music, and attempting to teach him social

graces. But his failure to reﬂect the enterprising aspects of her nature as well as his

162

inability to adopt her ﬂexible attitude toward sexual relations play important roles in her
decision to replace him. And although She is not domineering, George Sand’s Madeleine
herself is drawn to Francois because he demonstrates deep compassion for those around
him, putting their needs before his own in the same way she does. Thus he implicitly
validates her own chosen code of ethics. More complicated and at times mutually
contradictory demands are placed on the relatively recent male Galateas in French
literature by women. Perhaps this situation reﬂects the greater difﬁculty that French
women may have encountered in exercising their autonomy during a period when society
was offering them a wider range of choices: divorce, for example, became legal only in
1884.2 Jacques Silvert has the complicated task of mirroring Raoule de Vénérande’s
gender ﬂexibility, playing weakness to her strength, poverty to her wealth, male to her
female, yet femininity to her masculinity. His failure, in the form of homoerotic
impulses, leads to his destruction. Finally, Cheri’s role as a dependent and somewhat
spoiled child allows Le’a to study her ability to nurture, provide, and sometimes indulge,
while his role as her lover reassures her of her continued beauty and desirability and her
success in her battle against age as she nears the age of ﬁfty. When Chéri can no longer
reﬂect this image, through no fault of his own but simply because of the passage of time,
Le’a recognizes the need to let him go, but it is Chéri’s inability to step out of the ﬁrst role
that proves to be his undoing. These relationships, except for Madeleine and Francois’s,
all fail when the statue reﬂects a distorted image of its maker, suggesting that the
protagonist derives a measure of narcissistic pleasure from her relationship, but also
that—as Hegel’s Master-Slave dialectic suggests—the Master is dependent on the Slave

for her sense of identity.3

163

 

 

Such relationships, which test traditional power structures, can best be explored
on the margins of society, where there is greater freedom to question conventionality.
Madamedes Belles Cousines achieves greater freedom through her Widowhood. Her
escape from the system of exchange allows her to take a lover she can control. Her
husband’s age pushes Marguerite’s protagonist to the edges of Pamplonan society. She
rarely goes out, dresses modestly, and behaves in exemplary fashion. Her semi-
withdrawal from society and her husband’s extraordinary trust in her allow her to
experiment with a new kind of lover who will adore her yet respect her virtue. Likewise,
Henriette de Mortsauf ‘s husband motivates her withdrawal from society, not because of
his age but because of the need to hide his mental instability. Deprived of most social
contact, Henriette tries to form Félix into a companion who will love and support her yet,
like d’Avannes, not challenge her commitment to chastity. Madame de Warens’s
separation from her husband, conversion from Protestantism to Catholicism, status as a
foreigner, and unconventional moral education all serve to alienate her from mainstream
society, permitting her a freedom undoubtedly shared by few women of her era. The
entire setting of George Sand’s novel may have been considered marginal to many of her
readers. By situating her story in the Berry, She frees all her characters from the strictures
of urban society. Madeleine gains additional freedom from her husband’s lack of interest
in her and her activites. As an orphan, Raoule de Vénérande can freely marginalize
herself by refusing to marry. Raoule’s secure position in the upper echelons of the
aristocratic establishment enables her to further ﬂout tradition by involving herself with

someone decidedly outside polite society. Finally, Léa, as a member of the demimonde,

164

 

 

 

escapes all expectations to marry and have children and has the ﬁnancial resources to
determine how she wants to live.

Despite their shared concerns with marriage, maternity and marginality, these
texts differ in important ways, revealing the changing function of female Pygmalion
ﬁgures as we move from the ﬁfteenth to the twentieth century and shift from
predominantly male to exclusively female writers. The earlier texts by male authors
place a woman in Pygmalion’s role to serve her prote'gé’s ends. A Signiﬁcant element of
adolescent male fantasy informs these texts, in which the young man ﬁnds a beautiful,
experienced older woman to initiate him in the ways of love and life, teaching him skills

that he can take with him as he moves on to other conquests. In the novels by de la Sale,

 

Balzac, and Rousseau, the male emerges as the winner, ﬁnding success he owes in great II
measure to the woman who loved him. Jehan de Saintré becomes one of France’s
greatest knights thanks to the sponsorship and education he received from his lady while
Madamedes Belles Cousines is publicly humiliated, effectively stripped of the power that
enabled her to help Saintré. Likewise, Félix de Vandenesse beneﬁts signiﬁcantly from
his relationship with Mme de Mortsauf. He follows Henriette’s advice and proﬁts from
her connections in Parisian society to secure himself an enviable position with the king,
as well as considerable social standing. After her death, brought on by her inability to act
on her passion and her fears that he had abandoned her, Félix moves on to other women,
including the recipient of the letter that forms the majority of the text of the Lys dans la
vallée. Rousseau. surprisingly, provides a more realistic version of the male protégé’s
story. He proﬁts from his relationship with Mme de Warens, receiving food and housing

as well a mooring in his otherwise itinerant life. She provides him with love and security

165

and, by his own attribution, gives him the impetus to succeed. He professes to a desire to
repay her that propels him throughout his career, long after their relationship has ended.
Although Balzac’s text hints at a Similar dynamic, Rousseau’s story clearly demonstrates
that reversed Pygmalion relationships have negative as well as positive effects on the
young men who are transformed by them. Although Rousseau never acknowledges the
exploitative component of their relationship, its aftermath prevents him from engaging in
other signiﬁcant long-term relationships for the rest of his life.

Texts by women authors eliminate such male fantasizing, instead recounting
Pygmalion projects undertaken primarily for the sculptor’s beneﬁt. Even Marguerite’s
early modern text differs signiﬁcantly from Balzac’s romantic version of her story.
D’Avannes reaps few rewards from his relationship with the lady of Pamplona. As the
king’s younger brother, he already holds signiﬁcant social status and wealth. The grace
and beauty that attracted the lady’s gaze are admired by other women as well. Thus the
only beneﬁt he may derive from the relationship is the one his sculptor intended: a
greater sense of virtue which will safeguard him from future excesses like those he
indulged in with the folle. But the lady of Pamplona undertakes even this transformation
not for his beneﬁt, but for her own. Sublimating d’Avannes’s desire permits her the
unique prospect of taking a lover without compromising her virtue. The relationship
between Madeleine and Francois hardly meets the criteria of male fantasy, either. By
taking in a foundling, Madeleine inadvertently shapes an ideal partner for herself, but no
consummation of their love takes place until they have agreed to a lifetime commitment.
Francois will make no future conquests based on the knowledge he gains from

Madeleine. As we reach Rachilde’s and Colette’s texts, we ﬁnd that the balance of proﬁt

166

1"}

and loss has been reversed. Jacques and Chéri are sacriﬁced when they can no longer
fulﬁll the function for which they were designed. Raoule’s sacriﬁce of Jacques is sudden
and violent, restoring her power and reversing not only the gender roles in the Pygmalion
myth but also the transformation from lifelessness to being. Che’ri’s sacriﬁce has been
more gradual and inadvertent, resulting from Léa’s greater concern for their mutual
pleasure than for his development into a man. What is groundbreaking about Rachilde’s
and Colette’s texts, at least in the context of this study, is their presentation of the love
relationship as a chapter in a longer life story of a female protagonist. Both women had
lives before they met the young man who plays a central role in the novel and both, we
may be sure, live on after the relationship is over. This is especially true of Léa. Chéri
plays an important role in her ability to reshape her identity as she ages, ﬁrst assuring her
of her continued femininity and then helping her see that the time has come for her to
embrace the role of old woman and to play it as she has planned. But he remains a
supporting cast member to Léa’s starring role.

Although our women authors, unlike their male counterparts, readily place a
female character in a power position for the long term, freeing her from the status of
victim, none of them would have called herself a feminist. For Marguerite, the term is
simply anachronistic, but George Sand, Rachilde, and Colette all overtly refused it.
Despite their lack of interest in female solidarity, these women clearly understood the
value of independence and the ﬂexibility gained by living on the margins of society and
were willing to appropriate them for their protagonists.4

Unquestionably, permanent power imbalances in relationships are destructive,

whether the dominant power iS exercised by a male or a female. Analyzing these reverse

167

 

 

Pygmalion relationships using French and Raven’s theory illuminates power’s effect as it
swings wildly out of balance or approaches equilibrium. The relationships in which the

power discrepancies are greatest fail most dramatically. The only successful relationship
is the one where the members of the couple reach a balance, enabling them to go forward

as partners rather than as master and servant.

168

 

 

Notes

Chapter 1

I For a summary of the debate, see Taylor.

2 Elisabeth Caron presents the two sides of this discussion in the opening pages of her
article.

3 For a summary, see Mermier, p. 474.

4 In the battle with axes, Enguerrant’s hand is injured, preventing him from holding his ax
and thus forcing him to forfeit the match. Saintré defeats Loisellench in the joust on

horseback by breaking the straps on his garde-bras, and in the joust on foot, Saintré’s

 

lance gets caught in Loisellench’s glove, forcing Loisellench to drop his weapon. The
king then calls the match. Many of Saintré’s challenges are resolved in similar fashion, I-
demonstrating, as the narrator suggests, that he wins not because of his own superior

skills, but because God is with him.

5 Early critics suggested the relationship was chaste, but the narrator’s descriptions of

their exchanges in the preau can easily be interpreted as euphemistic.

Chapter 2

' In the Heptaméron itself, there are numerous examples of Marguerite’s privileging
personal spirituality over Catholic ritual. In novella 70, Oisille depicts her heroine dying
a holy death. There is no administration of last rites, only a personal confession of sin
made directly to God, with no clerical intervention (481). In contrast, the women of
novellas 60 and 61 undergo all the Catholic sacraments associated with death, including a
last confession, the taking of communion, and the rite of Extreme Unction. Both move

their witnesses to tears at the Spectacle of their piety, but both are faking it to escape

169

marriage and run off with another man (429, 438). In novella 23, another of Oisille’s
tales, a young woman’s ignorance of Reformation theology leads to her suicide. A
Franciscan monk pretending to be her husband sleeps with her. When she ﬁnds out she
has been dishonored, she kills herself. Oisille thus explains her actions: “Et alors elle, qui
n’avait jamais appris des Cordeliers sinon la conﬁance des bonnes oeuvres, la satisfaction
des péchés par austérité de vie, jeﬁnes et disciplines, qui du tout ignorait la grace donnée
par notre bon Dieu par le mérite de son Fils, la remission des péchés par son sang, la
réconciliation du Pére avec nous par sa mort, la vie donnée au pécheurs par sa seule bonté

et miséricorde, se trouva Si troublée en l’assaut de ce désespoir, fondé sur l’énormité et

 

gravité du péché, sur l’amour du mari et l’honneur du lignage, qu’elle estima la mort trop

fir—in ——.

plus heureuse que sa vie” (239).

The Reformers’ ideas infuse Marguerite’s poetry even more deeply. Whether
Marguerite was a Protestant or whether she remained Catholic has long been debated. In
her introduction to Marguerite’s Chansons Spirituelles Michele Clément concludes that
the choice between the two was not yet necessary in Marguerite’s day. Marguerite was
clearly inﬂuenced by Reformed thinkers, but there was still hope that the Church might
reform itself from within. There is no doubt, however, about the pervasiveness of
Reformed theology in Marguerite’s writing. The second stanza of Chanson 5 provides
one a myriad of possible examples.

Si quelqu’un parle de la Foy
En la mettant quasi a riens
Au prix des oeuvres de la Loy,

Les estimant les plus grand biens,

170

Sa doctrine est novelle,

Laissez le la, passez avant;

Autant en emporte le vent. (95)

2 Aside from Saffredent, Dagoucin, Hircan, and Géburon, who display admirable
swordsmanship in the Prologue, Amadour of novella 10 is the only major character in the
Heptaméron who wins honor through military prowess.

3 Bonnivet is named in novella 14, in which he seduces a Milanese lady by deception. In
novella 16, a French gentleman, likely Bonnivet again, seduces a Milanese widow
through persistence. The discussions following both stories point out the self-serving
nature of sexual conquest. Géburon, the narrator of novella 16 opens the discussion
following his tale by addressing to the women of the company a confession: “Car nostre
gloire, nostre félicité et nostre contentement, c’est de vous veoir prises et de vous oster ce
qui vous est plus cher que la vie” (Matthieu-Castellani 262, 3).

4 The critical debate over whether or not their relationship was in fact chaste or whether
talking all night was just a euphemism misses the point of Oisille’s story. The discussion
may be valid for the original medieval version of the story, but is not important to
Oisille’s ends.

5 Rolandine’s story (novella 21) ends happily, but the husband she marries at the end of
the tale is never an important character in the story’s development. The relationship the
tale narrates is disastrous, resulting in Rolandine’s imprisonment and her lover’s
inﬁdelity and death. The German couple of novella 32 finds happiness at the end of their
tale as well, but their story is not one of two lovers coming together, but of punishment

and forgiveness for the wife’s inﬁdelity.

171

6 Noble women who draw the censure of the storytellers include the Duchesse de
Bourgogne (novella 70), the foreign lady who kept men in her wardrobe (novella 49), the
incestuous mother (novella 30), the unfaithful wife whose husband avenged himself by
means of a poisoned salad (novella 36) and another lady of Pampelune who fell in love
with her priest (novella 35).

7 This masking of illicit acts with sacred activities occurs frequently in the Heptameron.
(La Guardia 136). For example, Rolandine’s ﬁancé disguises himself as a monk to see
her (21), the prieur of Saint-Martin-deS-Champs uses several religious covers to conceal
his lust for Marie Héroet (22), another lady of Pampelune attends mass in order to see the
priest she desires (35), and a Cordelier takes advantage of his power to impose penance
on a young girl in an attempt to seduce her (41).

8 An important difference to note is that while Galatea was finished and Saintré’s
transformation complete, this is a step in d’Avannes’s transformation. The lady of
Pampelune’s project is only completed with her death, an ironic inversion of the new life
that completes Pygmalion’s work.

9 The contrast between light and dark is one of many Marcel Tetel notes in his study of
the language and imagery of the Heptaméron, where light versus dark parallels the
contrast between love and lust, discovery and dissimulation (96). In a pathetic fallacy,
the darkness of the day both mirrors and encourages d’Avannes’s less than virtuous
intentions.

’0 The lady is no dupe, however. Her promise to do all she can contains a qualification:

“Si vous estes amoureux de la vertu comme il appartient 51 tel seigneur que vous, je vous

172

serviray pour y parvenir de toutes les puissances que Dieu a mises en moy » (Mathieu-
Castellani 381).

” Cholakian, like Lajarte cited below, views D’Avannes’s manipulation of the language
of virtue as a ruse (133). Nicole Cazauran disagrees. “Dans le contexte, l’aveu est donc
placé sous un double jour, sans qu’il prenne, comme semble 1e croire Philippe de Lajarte,
valeur de “parodie”, et son langage n’est pas Si menteur qu’il ne S’accorde du moins a
une vérité. Dans le penchant qui l’attire vers une dame dont il admire depuis longtemps
la sagesse, le seigneur d’Avannes ne saurait reconnaitre le désire de « se amuser » qui l’a

fait s’adresser a la « legiere et belle » jeune femme dont la conquéte fut Si facile. ll lui

 

faut, pour s’exprimer, d’autres mots, tels qu’il puisse y traduire, avec mauvaise foi mais

;.-——— 0-.-

sans hypocrisie, une dévotion qui s’adresse confusément a la vertu comme a la beauté de
celle qu’il aime. Mais de l’amour « parfait », ce n’est la que l’ombre, ou au mieux, le
plus bas degré, si l’on croit, avec celle qui l’écoute, que le jeune homme en sera un jour
« susceptible ». Son discours serait alors vrai d’une autre maniere encore, comme
promesse d’avenir et préﬁgurant une perfection déja obscurément désirée. » (240)

'2 In many Pygmalion texts, including Ovid’s, there is an undercurrent of incest in the
love of the creator for his or her creature, and vice versa. Its appearance in this text as
well, where the Pygmalion project focuses on fostering virtue, points to its inextricability
from the dynamics of a relationship between such dyads. This text does not really
explore the Oedipal implications of such a relationship as some others do. D’Avannes’s
identification of the lady as his mother functions primarily as a ruse with which he can

extract the kiss he so ardently desires.

173

’3 In experiments designed to test the 1959 theory, Raven found personal sanctions to be
the most effective basis of power (Raven, Schwarzwald, and Koslowsky, 1998).

'4 This separation of the creation from the creator is not present in Ovid’s tale, nor in
other versions where the Pygmalion ﬁgure is male. This difference underlines the
differing expectations for mature men and women in much of Western culture. Men, as a
condition of adulthood, must leave the home and enter the world, whether to undertake
quests, serve at court, enter politics, go to war, etc. Women, on the other hand, can much
more easily be conﬁned to the home, safely under the control of their creators. These
differing expectations create another obstacle to the success of female Pygmalion ﬁgures,
or perhaps a softening and more humane presentation of a woman’s project when
compared to a man’s.

'5 The mule driver’s wife of novella 2 suffered violence and ultimately death rather than
submit to her would-be seducer.

‘6 Marguerite was married first to the Duke of Alencon and then to the king of Navarre,
both times in moves to advance or stabilize the position of France’s royal family. Her
daughter Jeanne d’Albret was married against her will to the Duke of Cleves, a man she
found repugnant, but to whom her father and uncle deemed marriage politically
expedient. In her letter requesting annulment of the marriage, a process with which
Marguerite helped her daughter, Jeanne speciﬁes the role her parents played in arranging
and executing the marriage (Déjean 250).

’7 Giséle Mathieu-Castellani argues convincingly that Balzac drew his inspiration for the

Lys from Heptaméron 26. In addition to parallels in character, story, and plot structures,

174

she cites evidence that Balzac had borrowed a volume of the Heptaméron from the Royal
Library in 1824 and that his Grande Brete‘che rewrites novella 32.

’8 Book 5 of Emile discusses in detail the traits of an ideal woman, placing her firmly in
the domestic Sphere.

’9 In “Sémiotique du corps malade dans la Come’die Humaine,” Lucienne Frappier-Mazur
identiﬁes the link between an excess of passion and the inability to eat that consumes and
destroys Henriette (28).

2° The regrets that remain in Henriette’s letter are only a shadow of those expressed in the
first edition of the Lys. Nancy Miller cites the first edition: “Une heure de Lady Dudley
vaut l’éternité.” (69). Madame de Berny, the real-life model for Henriette, asked Balzac

to remove them, writing, “...la mort de Mme de Mortsauf n’a pas besoin de ces horribles

regrets. lls nuisent a la belle lettre qu’elle écrit” (Arrault 13).

Chapter 3

’ Rousseau and Francois both have women who care for them initially. Rousseau’s aunt
Suzon and Francois’s foster mother la Zabelle are their first female caregivers. However,
neither bonds enduringly with these ﬁrst mother ﬁgures.

2 Despite Rousseau’s protestations of innocence, he expresses rather bizarre fetishistic
behavior in relationship to Maman’s possessions, if not her person. He passionately
kisses the contents of his room because they belong to her, and gobbles up tidbits of food

taken from her mouth.

175

3 Rousseau attributes her decision to a desire to separate him from a negative inﬂuence,
Venture de Villeneuve. Rousseau’s biographers feel it was just as likely that she had a
mission to complete.

4 Felicity Baker sees the lack of detail in this part of the portrait of Mme de Warens as a
means of shielding her (and possibly himself as well) from accusations of espionage. Her
mysterious trip to Paris, Rousseau’s job in the Royal Survey office, and his uncle’s role
in building Geneva’s fortiﬁcations suggest interesting political subplots, but Rousseau
omits any details that may shed light on the matter.

5 In “Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the Peril of Reﬂection”, Jean Starobinski points out that
Rousseau is happy only when desire is concealed, deferred, or transformed. Mme de
Warens’ decision to add sexual intimacy to their relationship taints it in his eyes(30).

6 Christopher Kelly explains that Mme de Warens is able to safeguard Rousseau from
entanglements with other women by not stimulating his imagination as she satisfies his
sexual impulses. “The weakening of Jean-Jacques’s sexual imagination, which would
have led him to other women, strengthens his less sexual imagination, which leads him
into a community formed by Mme de Warens. It is her ability to separate physical and
imaginary needs in order to satisfy each separately that allows Mme de Warens to
construct her own unusual domestic community.” (143).

7 Many biographers suspect that the household triangle was not as successful as in
Rousseau’s depiction. Inaccuracies of detail suggest an attempt to conceal that Anet’s
death was not accidental, but a suicide in response to Mme de Warens’ sexual

relationship with Rousseau.

176

 

8 Rousseau’s defense seems to have been very successful. Criticisms of the relationship
between him and Mme de Warens, including those of Balzac and Sand, place blame on
his shoulders. Given his status, Rousseau is certainly the bigger target, while our
knowledge of Mme de Warens extends little beyond what Rousseau tells us. But
Rousseau’s narration of their relationship certainly plays a role in this perception of his
guilt. Thus, despite Sand’s comment that he Should have been willing to appear a bit
ﬂippant and ungrateful to his benefactress rather than revealing her faults, it appears that
Rousseau may have been willing to sacrifice a bit of his reputation in order to protect
hers. Of course, reader reaction may also have been an unintended consequence of his
desire to portray their relationship in a light as ideal as possible.

9 Rousseau laments his own lack of power and his inability to curb Mme de Warens’
spending after Anet’s death. “Anet était un garcon exact et rangé, qui maintenait l’ordre
dans la maison de sa maitresse.... Elle-meme craignait sa censure, et se contenait
davantage dans ses dissipations. Ce n’était pas assez pour elle de son attachement, elle
voulait conserver son estime, et elle redoutait le juste reproche qu’il osait quelquefois lui
faire qu’elle prodiguait le bien d’autrui autant que le Sien. Je pensais comme lui, je le
disais méme ; mais je n’avais pas le méme ascendant sur elle, et mes discours n’en
imposaient pas comme les siens.”(243).

‘0 And, like Saintré, he exacts a degree of revenge by telling their story. Antoine de la
Sale does not give us Saintré’s version of the story, so we don’t know whether he retold it
accurately or not. Extensive biographical work on Rousseau gives us the opportunity to
check his facts, however. Letters between Rousseau and Maman during his trip reveal

that he knew of their relationship long before he returned (Cranston 132). Thus his pious

177

resolution to return faithfully to the woman he loved only to find his place taken was not
quite as dramatic as he would have us believe.

” The nature/nurture debate cannot be cleanly resolved here, because of Francois’s
mother’s presence near the end of the novel. Her ability to provide Francois with
significant financial resources leads us to assume that she is a member of the upper
classes and that Francois may very well be of noble blood. Thus his success, especially
when compared to that of other champis, may be attributable both to his environment and
to his genes.

’2 The relationship between Mme de Warens and Rousseau truly crosses the line of incest.
Mme de Warens holds all the power in their relationship. Despite his reservations, which
he never overcomes, Rousseau has no choice but to acquiesce. A sexual relationship
between two such unequal parties cannot be viewed as healthy or legitimate.

’3 The irony of this statement is not lost. Rousseau the failure is none other than
Rousseau the author, composer, and political and educational philosopher, while
Francois’s success consists of earning a living and satisfying his employer. However,
when judging these two young men against the standards their female Pygmalions set for
them, Francois emerges as the clear winner.

1" Peter France notes that Rousseau knew he had been replaced long before he returned
from Montpellier. Instead of the heroic return he paints, Rousseau was well aware that
he was returning to a degrading situation that he was willing to endure for the sake of
being close to Mme de Warens (93).

’5 The incestuous nature of Francois and Madeleine’s relationship arises frequently in

criticism of this text, and remains largely unquestioned. Kathryn Crecelius notes that

178

Sand’s novels are built on incest, which is often the goal of the narrative and leads to a
fulfilling rather than fatal end (2, 4). Naomi Schor states that in Francois [e champi,
incest is not only consummated, but happily so, leaving the mother-son couple as joyous
as any at the end of a fairy tale (151). None of these critics explains why these
relationships are fulﬁlling and, oddly enough, healthy despite their breaking of the incest
taboo. In fact, although the relationship between Madeleine and Francois may violate a
strict interpretation of incest, since, as Schor points out, parenthood is severed from
genealogy in the logic of idealism (124), the power imbalance that makes such a
relationship so harmful has been erased.

’6 That Sand applies the standard of responsibility as a measure of maturity to both young
men and women is evident in Nanon. Another orphaned child free to stand outside the
bonds of the generational transmission of patriarchal values of class and gender, Nanon
earns recognition as a woman in her great-uncle’s eyes not when she marries or becomes
a mother, but when she begins contributing to the support of the family, taking on the
responsibilities of a full partner (Massardier—Kenney 164).

‘7 Helynne Hansen identifies Mauprat as the turning point for Sand’s heroines. In earlier
works, her protagonists are unable to ﬁnd happiness in marriage, but Edmée de Mauprat
shapes the man she loves into a suitable husband, both in terms of his responsibility and
maturity and in his fulﬁllment of Rousseau’s ideal of love and sentimentality (193).

‘8 In Nanon, Kenney interprets the protagonist’s refusal to become an object of romantic
love, maintaining her role as a mother ﬁgure, as a means of retaining power (177).

’9 Aside from arguments based on the text itself, one can also appeal to evidence in the

rest of Sand’s work. Sand’s heroines, including Edmée de Mauprat, Nanon, and Isidora,

179

 

do not bow meekly to the pressures of patriarchy, but strive to find happiness by escaping
its bonds. Sand herself played the double role of mother and lover, making it difﬁcult to
believe that she would deny this possibility to her heroines. Madeleine, then, is clearly a
special case, her desire quieted only because to voice it strongly would raise suspicions of
incest

2" In justifying Madeleine, Sand may be defending herself. In her biography of Sand,
Elizabeth Harlan discusses the maternalistic relationships Sand had with younger men,
including Musset, Chopin, and Manceau. Musset wrote to her, “You thought you were
my mistress, you were only my mother; heaven made us for one another...But we were
too tightly bound, it was incest that we committed” (Harlan 181,2). Harlan goes on to
suggest that Sand used the incestuous tension in her relationships with younger men as a
prototype for the relationships she portrayed in her fiction, which Harlan ﬁnds more
confessional than her autobiography (210, 264).

Chapter 4

I Raoule’s justification of her behavior based on the interests of an entire class of women
is surprising in light of Rachilde’s adamant stance against feminism. She felt she won
her freedoms on the basis of her own character and value and felt no sense of solidarity
with other women. Those whom She found exceptional, she encouraged, but she felt it
was the responsibility of each woman to earn respect based on her own qualities. Women
as a class were not deserving of the rights feminine activists sought for them (Holmes 76,
77).

2 Raoule’s dressing up is like Rachilde’s own role playing. Alfred Valette wrote her a

letter expressing his pleasure and surprise at seeing her dressed in so feminine a costume

180

at a party, but he is unsettled because he is no longer sure when she is cross-dressed.
This incident, as well as the ﬁctional one represented here, leads to Melanie Hawthorne’s
observation that Rachilde views gender as performed and provisional (164).

3 Nelly Sanchez attributes this emphasis on heredity, seen also in Raoule’s character, as a
Naturalist inﬂuence in Rachilde’s writing.

4 This phrase, “en meme temps qu’il fait s’écarter les cuisses”, is suppressed in all
versions of Monsieur Ve’nus except the ﬁrst, 1884 edition and the newest 2004 edition.
Its editors, Melanie Hawthorne and Liz Constable, argue that the phrase “forces the
reader to confront the degree of Rachilde’s challenge to the sex/ gender system” (xxviii),
accentuating the novel’s role in “explicitly challeng[ing] the gender hierarchy that the
male role is dominant because penetrative. Raoule penetrates yet remains a woman and
asserts heterosexuality while reconfiguring body parts to mimic sameness” (xxix).

5 Erica Eisinger identifies Colette’s plots as androgynous, with any of the primary roles
capable of being played by either gender (100). This flexibility could explain Léa’s
freedom. Of course, reversing the gender roles as Colette has assigned them would
reduce Chéri to a story even more frequently told than that of the older woman and the
younger man. While Eisinger’s observation that Colette’s plots are not gender-speciﬁc
may apply to some of her other texts, the tragedy of Chéri is a direct result of the gender
roles being played out as assigned. Society tolerates May-December relationships
between younger women and older men, likely because a man’s value as a partner is
viewed as extending beyond his physical desirability. Le’a plays the traditionally male
role of ﬁnancial provider for her young lover, but must maintain her beauty for the

relationship to continue.

181

 

" Kloepfer et al. note other prominent reversals as well. The ridiculous couple of Lili and
Guido consist of a seventy-year-old woman and her seventeen-year-old lover whose
father threatens to send him to a convent if he marries his aging mistress. Le’a’s friend
Patron breaks off with his lover because She is ashamed that Patron feels the need to
work, rather than to let her provide for him (127).

7 The first text of this chapter, of course, contains several.

8 This episode of the story is reminiscent of Heptaméron 26 again, where the lady of
Pamplona cares for the seigneur d’Avannes, who has made himself sick from his
escapades with another woman.

Conclusion

 

’ In her analysis of the relationship between Raoule de Vénérande and Jacques Silvert,
Dorothy Kelly relies on Freud’s view of female desire as being essentially narcissistic.
When women reach sexual maturity, they desire themselves rather than making an
object-choice. The means of escape from this narcissistic desire is motherhood (146,7).
2 Divorce was first legalized in 1792, but was restricted under Napoleon and abolished
under the Restoration. It was reinstated in 1884, but only on the grounds of adultery,
cruelty, slander, and criminal sentence (Campbell 503).

3 Hegel describes the Master as dependent on the Slave in two ways. First, he is
dependent on the Slave’s recognition of his dominance and second, on his work. Hegel
summarizes, “for just when the master has effectively achieved lordship, he really finds
that something has come about quite different from an independent consciousness. It is
not an independent, but rather a dependent consciousness that he has achieved” (Hegel

236). Conversely, the Slave develops the independent consciousness as a result of his

182

 

interaction with the world and the self-awareness and self-mastery he develops as a
response to the state of fear and servitude in which he lives.

4 The convent community in George Sand’s 1839 version of Le’lia, created and
maintained by the title character, represents an exception because it functions effectively

to increase the nuns’ self-esteem.

 

183

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