The Princess of Cleves was first published in 1678 and is often believed to be the first significant French novel. Marie de La Fayette paved the way for future novelists with her work. The significance and impact of her work goes far beyond the actual text. She combines original and classic concepts throughout her story. Her figurative language is still prevalent and widely used in modern literature. De La Fayette’s innovative ideas contributed to one of the most important time periods, the Enlightenment, and continues to inspire today.
The Princess of Cleves focuses on the forbidden love shared between Madame de Cleves and Monsieur de Nemours. The princess yearns for Monsieur de Nemours, but forces herself to remain faithful to her husband even after his death. Madame de Cleves often fakes illness, throughout the story, to avoid the temptation of acting on her feelings for Nemours. Madame de Cleves pretends “to be ill, in order to have a good excuse for not going, because real reasons would not be approved and should not be suspected” (De La Fayette 89). Nemours, similarly, forgoes French Court events, under the pretense of sickness to remove himself from Madame de Cleves’ presence. Lovesickness is often featured in the plots of movies and novels. The term lovesickness can be described as the anguish one feels in the absence of a loved one. Both Nemours and Madame de Cleves fake sickness to remain virtuous, but in doing so, they sacrifice a chance of true happiness with one another. The absence from each other’s lives brings them only sorrow. The Princess of Cleves was one of the first of many novels to contain the concept of lovesickness. Contemporary authors seem to have modeled their storylines after The Princess of Cleves....
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...ame De La Fayette’s The Princess of Cleves is a timeless piece that has the same impact on readers as it did back in 1678. Her use of figurative language, throughout the story, address social issues and convey strong morals; many of which still apply today. Before The Princess of Cleves, the focus for many was on the significance of reputation and status. De La Fayette defies the social standards of her time and teaches the importance of humility, reasoning and introspection, and virtue. De La Fayette powerful analogies and metaphors will continue to influence writers and remain relevant to audiences worldwide.
Works Cited
De La Fayette, Madame. The Princess of Cleves. The Norton Anthology of Western Literature. Ed. Sarah Lawall. 8th ed. Vol. 2. New York: Norton, 2006. 70-159. Print.
Holy Bible, New International Version. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984. Print.
The author of the book, The Ladies of Missalonghi, by Colleen McCullough describes to the reader how Missy, an unattractive woman, in a small town differs from Alicia.
Naivety as well as the longing to fit into society with a loving man and stable, well-to-do peasant family deceived an honorable woman. Bertrande de Rols’ young marriage had difficulties from the start. With the guidance from family, the Catholic Church and Basque customs, Bertrande attempted to follow the sixteenth-century expectations for women, but was misled by her own fear, loneliness and catastrophic past.
The opening lines of the novel shows the motive of passion. In the novel, later, Mme. de Clèves asks for further explanation for the love between a woman and the king with “several other lovers” (1039). This passion forms the “political and social effects” (1039) that change the norms in the court. The court mixes this false “event into its own structure, so that the implausible now becomes the n...
Kempe, Margery. "From The Book of Margery Kempe." The Norton Anthology of Literature By Women. 2nd ed. Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1996. 18-24.
Catherine has an extremely naive, novel-like view of love. “[Henry’s] name was not in the Pump-room book, and curiosity could do no more. He must be gone from Bath.yet he had not mentioned that his stay would be so short! This sort of mysteriousness, which is always so becoming in a hero, threw a fresh grace in Catherine's imagination around his persona and manners, and increased her anxiety to know more of him,” (34-35). She is obsessed with Henry’s “mysteriousness”, not so dissimilar to the heroines in her novels, who were all in love with tall, dark and mysterious men. Although her naivete and imagination almost get her in trouble with Henry when she thinks his father has killed his mother, her naive obsession with him is the only reason their relationship ever
In a world surrounded by war, death, and atrocity, it sometimes seems as if there is nowhere positive for the characters in the Gates of Ivory by Margaret Drabble to turn. In the mist of these bad images Drabble juxtaposes a unique view into the world of women’s reproduction and menstruation that has rarely been revealed in other novels. She shows that menstruation exposes feelings ranging from liberation and empowerment in Alix Bowen, to shame, disgust and sorrow in Mme. Savet Akrun. Drabble identifies similarities between women on both sides of the world, and between reproduction and women combating the death of the world’s war. Yet throughout these hard times and uncertainties, the women in the novel show their strength and power because they hold the key to keeping mankind alive: reproduction.
The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas is a short story written by Ursula Le Guin. In her story, Le Guin creates a model Utilitarian society in which the majority of its citizens are devoid of suffering; allowing them to become an expressive, artistic population. Le Guin’s unrelenting pursuit of making the reader imagine a rich, happy and festival abundant society mushrooms and ultimately climaxes with the introduction of the outlet for all of Omelas’ avoided misfortune. Le Guin then introduces a coming of age ritual in which innocent adolescents of the city are made aware of the byproduct of their happiness. She advances with a scenario where most of these adolescents are extremely burdened at first but later devise a rationalization for the “wretched one’s” situation. Le Guin has imagined a possible contemporary Utilitarian society with the goal to maximize the welfare of the greatest number of people. On the contrary, Kant would argue that using the child as a mere means is wrong and argue that the living conditions of the child are not universalizable. The citizens of Omelas must face this moral dilemma for all of their lives or instead choose to silently escape the city altogether.
The Lais of Marie de France is a compilation of short stories that delineate situations where love is just. Love is presented as a complex emotion and is portrayed as positive, while at other times, it is portrayed as negative. The author varies on whether or not love is favorable as is expressed by the outcomes of the characters in the story, such as lovers dying or being banished from the city. To demonstrate, the author weaves stories that exhibit binaries of love. Two distinct types of love are described: selfish and selfless. Love is selfish when a person leaves their current partner for another due to covetous reasons. Contrarily, selfless love occurs when a lover leaves to be in a superior relationship. The stark contrast between the types of love can be analyzed to derive a universal truth about love.
Norton Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Nina Baym. 8th ed. Vol A. New York: W.
De France, Marie. Lanval. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Ed. M.H. Abrams. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2000. 127-40.
Traditional female characteristics and female unrest are underscored in literary works of the Middle Ages. Although patriarchal views were firmly established back then, traces of female contempt for such beliefs could be found in several popular literary works. Female characters’ opposition to societal norms serves to create humor and wish- fulfillment for female and male audiences to enjoy. “Lanval” by Marie De France and “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” by Geoffrey Chaucer both show subversion of patriarchal attitudes by displaying the women in the text as superior or equal to the men. However, “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” also incorporates conventional societal ideas by including degradation of women and mistreatment of a wife by her husband.
Thundy, Zacharias P.. “THE BOOK OF THE DUCHESS: AN ELEGY OR ATEDEUM?” http://www.nd.edu/~zthundy/BD.html (3 May, 2003)
In The Lais of Marie de France, the theme of love is conceivably of the utmost importance. Particularly in the story of Guigemar, the love between a knight and a queen brings them seemingly true happiness. The lovers commit to each other an endless devotion and timeless affection. They are tested by distance and are in turn utterly depressed set apart from their better halves. Prior to their coupling the knight established a belief to never have interest in romantic love while the queen was set in a marriage that left her trapped and unhappy. Guigemar is cursed to have a wound only cured by a woman’s love; he is then sent by an apparent fate to the queen of a city across the shores. The attraction between them sparks quickly and is purely based on desire, but desire within romantic love is the selfishness of it. True love rests on a foundation that is above mere desire for another person. In truth, the selfishness of desire is the
Dalnekoff, Donna Isaacs. "Eldorado as an, ‘Impossible Dream’." Readings on Candide. Ed. Thomas Walsh. San Diego, Calif.: Greenhaven Press, 2001. P64-71. Rpt. in Literature Criticism from 1400 to 1800 vol. 110. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resource Center.
Yet critics have repeatedly misunderstood Catherine since the time of the novel's publication some seventy years ago. Those engaging in distinctly feminist analyses over the past twenty-five years have been particularly harsh on Hemingway's characterization of Catherine, viewing it as patronizing and shallow. In her response to the phallocentri...