The Artist as Animal in Nineteenth-Century French Literature

Description

The Artist as Animal in Nineteenth-Century French Literature traces the evolution of the relationship between artists and animals in fiction from the Second Empire to the fin de siècle. This book examines examples of visual literature, inspired by the struggles of artists such as Edouard Manet and Vincent van Gogh. Edmond and Jules de Goncourt’s Manette Salomon (1867), Émile Zola’s Therèse Raquin (1867), Jules Laforgue’s “At the Berlin Aquarium” (1895) and “Impressionism” (1883), Octave Mirbeau’s In the Sky (1892-1893) and Rachilde’s L’Animale (1893) depict vanguard painters and performers as being like animals, whose unique vision revolted against stifling traditions.Juxtaposing these literary works with contemporary animal theory (McHugh, Deleuze, Guattari and Derrida), zoo studies (Berger, Rothfels and Lippit) and feminism (Donovan, Adams and Haraway), Claire Nettleton explores the extent to which the nineteenth-century dissolution of the human subject contributed to a radical, modern aesthetic. Utilizing these interdisciplinary methodologies, Nettleton argues that while inducing anxiety regarding traditional humanist structures, the “artist-animal,” an embodiment of artistic liberation within an urban setting, is, at the same time, a paradigmatic trope of modernity. Front Matter ....Pages i-xiv Introduction (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 1-37 Front Matter ....Pages 39-39 A Caged Animal: The Avant-garde Artist in Edmond and Jules de Goncourt’s Manette Salomon (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 41-75 Buffon Versus the Beast: Taming the Wild Artist in Émile Zola’s Thérèse Raquin (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 77-104 Front Matter ....Pages 105-105 The Decadent Deep Sea: Jules Laforgue’s “At the Berlin Aquarium” (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 107-149 Said the Spider to the Fly: The Triumph of the Minor in Octave Mirbeau’s In the Sky (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 151-191 Féline Fatale: The New Woman as Cat-Woman in Rachilde’s L’Animale (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 193-230 Conclusion: Henri Rousseau and Synthetic Naïveté (Claire Nettleton)....Pages 231-238 Back Matter ....Pages 239-241