Description: This interdisciplinary study, which combines the sociohistorical approach with insights from feminist literary criticism, sheds new light on male bourgeois mythologies in nineteenth-century French society. Drawing on texts by Balzac, Flaubert, Maupassant, Zola, and the Goncourt brothers, the author examines contemporary constructions of women as reflected in the portrayal of the humble «bonne à tout faire», from Père Grandet's «pearl» of a servant, Grande Nanon, to the «sluts» of Zola's Pot-Bouille. The book concludes with an analysis of relations between maid and mistress, shown as governed sometimes by the laws of class difference, but also, in several of these texts, by a profoundly felt feminine complicity.
Review Quotes: «This is a highly original, interdisciplinary and timely contribution to feminist studies, as well as to cultural and literary history. By probing with lucid sophistication and unimpeachable scholarly and critical discrimination the representation of the maidservant in major works of nineteenth-century fiction, it provides a rich and detailed examination of the mythology surrounding this long-neglected yet central figure in such novels as 'Eugénie Grandet' by Balzac, 'Germinie Lacerteux' by the Goncourt brothers, 'Un Coeur simple' by Flaubert, 'Une vie' by Maupassant, and 'Pot-Bouille' by Zola. The author convincingly demonstrates that not until the nineteenth century did the maidservant emerge as a new literary type and appear as a major character in French fiction. The reasons why this was so are part of what might be called the sociology of literature, and Susan Yates tellingly brings out historical and political factors that had a bearing on this development, while skillfully avoiding the pitfall of reductive analysis. Yet another attractive feature of this book is that it is written in a lucid, highly readable style.»
(Gita May, Columbia University)
«This book is a carefully-argued literary analysis of the strains placed on the societal definition of women by the servant culture in nineteenth-century France. Its emphasis on the novel's participation in creating and perpetuating the two archetypes of the maidservant, 'perle' and 'souillon', sharply foregrounds the sexual and class politics of each text. The treatment of the maid as symbol as well as victim of the anxieties of the bourgeoisie is excellent. The male literary representation of working-class women's experiences is examined with a perceptive and keenly sympathetic eye, rendering the book an original contribution to a crucial but neglected aspect of nineteenth-century French literature.» (Arati Rao, Wellesley College)