THE AMBIVALENT ASPECTS OF

SÉVIGNÉ’S APPROACH TO

MOTHERHOOD AND ITS RELEVANCE TO

THE WIDER TOPIC OF LIFE LINES: FAMILY

CULTURE IN SEVENTEENTH

CENTURY FRANCE.

KEY AREAS OF INTEREST Family Background.

Insecurity and Intensity.

The Relationship Between Mother and Daughter.

Other Points to Consider.

FAMILY BACKGROUND Orphaned – no relationship with mother

or father. Closest relationships while growing up

with male relatives – daughter closest female relationship.

Widowed at 26 – substituting marital passion with passion for daughter.

INSECURITY AND INTENSITY Trying to impress people in the salon –

embellishing for publication, audience extends beyond her daughter.

Looking for reassurance about her writing style.

Authoritarian tone to overcome insecurities.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MOTHER AND DAUGHTER Jealousy – daughter has what mother

never had. Control vs. Care – to what extent? Sévigné – mother and father?

OTHER POINTS TO CONSIDER We only have one half of the

correspondence. Werther and Wilhelm. “She loves her as an elderly man loves a

young mistress who tortures him. It was a passion that was twisted and morbid.” Virginia Woolf.

USEFUL LINKS http://home.infionline.net/~ddisse/sevigne.html

--> for biographical information. http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/w/woolf/virginia/w

91d/chapter8.html --> Virginia Woolf essay on Madame de Sévigné.

http://www.lynetteabel.org/Report-Aesthetic-Realism-Mme-de-Sevigne.html an essay on intensity in the Sévigné correspondence.

http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/lit/historical/TheWomenoftheFrenchSalons/toc.html --> an online text ‘The Women of the French Salons’.

http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=cKWFFKsJ6V4&feature=related and for one man’s interpretation of the Sévigné correspondence...

READING LIST ‘Il faut que je vous conte’, Barnwell, T.H., ‘Fact

into Fiction in the Letters of Madame de Sévigné’, Seventeenth-Century French Studies, 19 (1997), pp. 109-124.

“Women and the politics of self representation in 17th century France” – Patricia Francis Cholakian

“Mother Daughter Mirroring in Mme de Sevigne’s letters: Identity confusion and the Lure of intimacy”- Jensen, K.A., Esprit Créatur 44 (2004), pp. 108-120.

“Centuries of Childhood” – P. Aries “Parents and Children in History” – D. Hunt

GLOSSARY OF KEY WORDS Intensity. Maternal. Authoritarian. Insecurity. Ambiguity.

ANY QUESTIONS?